NARCO-CRIMINAL ROGER KHAN LASHES OUT AT USG

C O N F I D E N T I A L GEORGETOWN 000433 SIPDIS SIPDIS WHA/CAR INL/LP DS/IP/WHA DS/ICI/PII DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE - PPETTY CARACAS FOR DAO AND LEGATT PORT OF SPAIN FOR DEA AND LEGATT SOUTHCOM ALSO FOR POLAD E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/11/2016 TAGS: SNAR PGOV PREL KCRM GY SUBJECT: NARCO-CRIMINAL ROGER KHAN LASHES OUT AT USG REF: A. PORT OF SPAIN 345 ¶B. GEORGETOWN 290 ¶C. GEORGETOWN 278 ¶D. GEORGETOWN 234 ¶E. GEORGETOWN 112 Classified By: Ambassador Roland W. Bullen For reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (U) Guyana's leading narco-trafficker Shaheed "Roger" Khan has stepped up his public relations attack since news of his grand jury indictment emerged May 5 on conspiracy to import cocaine emerged. Khan approached various media organizations May 10 with a statement painting himself as a victim of a harassment campaign by the USG, Guyana's security forces, and the opposition party PNC/R. ¶2. (U) Guyana's two independent newspapers ran stories about the statement but did not publish the statement itself. The Stabroek News' top headline May 11 quoted the Embassy's official response: "Mr. Khan is welcome to apply for a U.S. visa through our normal procedures in order to travel to the U.S. so that he can be processed through the U.S. judicial system". The government-owned Guyana Chronicle did not carry the story. ¶3. (C) Khan's statement claims that he met with the "Deputy Ambassador of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. Regional Security Officer of the Caribbean" in March 2006. This claim is false. At Khan's request, U.S. law enforcement officials did meet with him, but no State Department personnel participated in that meeting (ref A). The purpose of the meeting was ostensibly to discuss the secret recording Khan possessed of a conversation between the police commissioner and a prominent opposition politician (ref C),although Khan mostly resorted to self-aggrandizing monologues. ¶4. (C) COMMENT. Khan has launched this public relations attack out of desperation. He has been on the run since March, when a joint services team raided his businesses and the police issued a bulletin seeking him for questioning, making him a "wanted man" whereas he previously operated with impunity in Guyana. Khan is the self-styled vigilante protector of the GoG against perceived threatening Afro-Guyanese elements in the police, army, political opposition, and the Buxton gangs. In private conversations, very senior GoG leaders often reveal a similar sense of paranoia about the state security forces and also what can only be termed as nostalgia for the 2002-2003 period when death squads, under Khan's active management, were trying to "solve" Guyana's crime problem extra-judicially. As preposterous as Khan's statement is, it does underscore Post's belief that some GoG figures have greater trust in thugs like Khan to protect their interests than the police and army. END COMMENT. ¶5. (U) Text of statement follows. BEGIN TEXT: Statement by Shaheed Khan The Grand Jury Indictment, and anything flowing from it, including a request for my extradition have been motivated by political considerations. I am perceived by persons in the U.S.A., The Guyana Police Force (G.P.F.),The Guyana Defence Force (G.D.F.) and the People's National Congress Reform (P.N.C/R) as someone who has the will and capacity to fight crime and to protect the people of Guyana against a coup d'etat. During the crime spree in 2002 I worked closely with the crime-fighting sections of the Guyana Police Force and provided them with assistance and information at my own expense. My participation was instrumental in curbing crime during this period. When the American Diplomat MR. LESNIACK was kidnapped and taken to the village of Buxton I met with operatives from the American Embassy on a daily basis and provided them with information and hard evidence that led to the issuance of an arrest warrant for SHAWN BROWN, the person responsible for the kidnapping. More recently I met with American Operatives, including the Deputy Ambassador of the U.S. Embassy and the U.S.Regional Security Officer of the Caribbean, in March 2006 at the Ocean View International Hotel. I provided them with evidence that the leaders of the security forces in Guyana had strong political motives for encouraging and protecting the so-called "armed resistance of Buxton." That meeting lasted for about 3 hours and I expressed my concerns to them about national security. From the time the G.D.F. started to play a role in Guyana's crime problem in 2002 and now again in 2006 their only real target has been me, leading to my illegal arrest by the G.D.F. in 2002 and the targeting of my business premises and persons connected to me, in 2006. The timing of the request by the Americans for my extradition is no coincidence. It has coincided with a period of Guyana's history when the country's security is most at risk, and most vulnerable to a coup d'etat. Guyanese are urged not to forget the role of the Americans in the 1960's in our country or the fabrication of "weapons of mass destruction" to justify that country's political agenda in Iraq. The indictment against me is a similar fabrication and is actuated by bad faith so that I may be punished, detained and restricted in my movements to set the scene for the P.N.C./R to thwart the democratic process and to fulfill their political ambitions by any means necessary. The silence of the American Embassy concerning matters of national security is tacit approval of the violent depths of which we have recently plunged. It should be noted that it took a Grand Jury less time to indict me than it is taking the American Government to authenticate the voices on the taped recording allegedly between Commissioner FELIX and the PNC/R Vice Chairman. The disinclination of the Americans to do the authentication and their unwillingness to even comment on my stated close relationship with Police Commissioner FELIX should be compared with their previous eagerness to listen to the likes of SHAFEEK BACCHUS when the professionalism of a PPP-C Government Minister was in question. In this regard, the Americans have b een acting in collusion with leaders of the G.P.F. and G.D.F. and the PNC/R. Leaders of the G.P.F. and the G.D.F. have recently been cited for contempt of Court orders and no longer have respect for the rule of law. The G.P.F. and the G.D.F. are now setting themselves up as the de facto power in Guyana. The Americans aided and abetted a criminal rebellion in Haiti to remove a democratically elected government. The rebellion was successful and an interim American puppet government was installed. This interim government never charged or prosecuted the rebels after the ouster of Aristide. Latin America is moving away from U.S. hegemony and now socialist governments are in Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Cuba, Guyana and it is also likely that Peru and Nicaragua will follow the same path. Guyana has once again assumed geopolitical importance and it is crucial for American interests to install a puppet regime here in Guyana. END TEXT. Bullen