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