AUXILIARY POLICE ASSESSMENT TEAM BEGINS WORK

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 004245 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR SCA/FO DAS GASTRIGHT, SCA/A, S/CRS, S/CT, EUR/RPM STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE, AID/DCHA/DG NSC FOR AHARRIMAN OSD FOR BREZINSKI CENTCOM FOR CFC-A, CG CJTF-76, POLAD E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: SNAR PGOV PTER AF SUBJECT: AUXILIARY POLICE ASSESSMENT TEAM BEGINS WORK REF: KABUL 4001 KABUL 00004245 001.2 OF 002 ¶1. (SBU) After the recent Policy Action Group (PAG) decision to move ahead with recruiting auxiliary police (AXP) under MoI command and control, with Zabol as the pilot province (reftel),MoI with CSTC- A support immediately began to organize an assessment team. An advance group of MoI, CSTC-A, and U.S. Embassy experts under the leadership of an MoI Colonel arrived in Kandahar on Sept 15 to carry out the logistical planning needed to begin the Zabol pilot project, moving on to Zabol the next day. The full team, which will include additional MoI personnel, ISAF, and UNAMA representatives, should be complete and on the ground o/a Sept 19. ¶2. (SBU) The team is eager to move ahead with recruitment and training, although details remain to be worked out. Support from Zabol Governor Arman will be critical - Zabol was chosen in part because Arman is seen as supportive of central government efforts - and it is not yet clear whether that will be forthcoming. If recruits do sign up for the program, the team will have to swing into full gear quickly to set up training schedules, equipment distribution, and deployment planning. (Note: Late reports indicate an initial tranche of 30 recruits has been identified to begin training soon. End note.) ¶3. (SBU) Both MoI and the international community are concerned about who will pay salaries. Central to the plan is shifting salaries from the governor to the MoI to ensure MoI control. So long as the AXP are fully under the command and control of the MoI, we have taken the position that they should be treated like ordinary police. Under that circumstance they would be eligible to come under the LOTFA payment structure. There is enough money allocated to police payments in present ASFF funding streams to increase the U.S. LOTFA contribution enough to cover at least some of the AXP, or else to pay directly out of a parallel mechanism. The Ambassador has made it clear to the IC that any additional U.S. contribution should not be used to pay the LOTFA shortfall, but rather would be earmarked for AXP. He also said that the U.S. donation would be limited for now to the recruitment of approximately 800 AXP for Zabol province, and we would make no further commitment until we had assurance that the program would work and the new auxiliary patrolmen would be completely under MoI control. If the governors refuse to relinquish control over their militias, U.S. funds would not be used to defray their expenses. Comment -------------- ¶4. (SBU) This is very much a work in progress. We are receiving daily reports from the assessment team in the field, which includes INL police experts and an Embassy reporting officer. We will in a position to report more fully on the substance of their efforts in a week or two, when the results begin to be seen. The U.S. members of the assessment team are under instructions to keep the team in the field until the program is implemented. Meanwhile, the security situation in Kandahar and Ghazni after the KABUL 00004245 002.2 OF 002 recent military activity there will compel a rapid extension of effort to those provinces as soon as we have confirmation that the experiment is on the right track. NEUMANN