CHADIAN FM ACCUSES SAUDIS OF AIDING REBELS

C O N F I D E N T I A L NDJAMENA 001368 SIPDIS SIPDIS LONDON AND PARIS FOR AFRICA WATCHERS E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/27/2016 TAGS: PREL PTER PREF CD SU SA LY SUBJECT: CHADIAN FM ACCUSES SAUDIS OF AIDING REBELS REF: A. N'DJAMENA 1360 ¶B. N'DJAMENA 1356 ¶C. N'DJAMENA 1357 ¶D. N'DJAMENA 1358 Classified By: Poloff John O'Leary. Reasons 1.4 (b) & (d) ¶1. (U) Chadian Foreign Minister Allam-Mi called in the Ambassador this morning, 11/27, to discuss the current rebel attacks in Chad and the GOC's public allegation that Saudi Arabia is supporting the rebellion. The FM was meeting with each Chief of Mission individually. ¶2. (C) The FM stated that a rebel column of approximately 80 vehicles attacked the regional capital of Abeche and that many of the rebel fighters belonged to the Kreda ethnic group. The Kreda, stated the FM, tend to be fundamentalists and have ties to al-Qa'ida in Saudi Arabia; hence, they probably have a terrorist connection. The FM went on to state that rebel leader Mahamat Nouri (United Front for Democracy and Development and a former Chadian ambassador to Riyadh) was a close friend of the Saudi Defense Minister, who had given Nouri two million dollars to support the rebellion. ¶3. (C) Allam-Mi noted that the rebels withdrew before they could be engaged by reinforced elements of the Chadian National Army (ANT). He bemoaned the lack of an ANT rapid reaction capability as well as a lack of sufficient air surveillance. ¶4. (C) The Foreign Minister reiterated that Chad would accept an international civilian police/observer force on the Chadian side of the border with Sudan to protect the refugee camps. The GOC did not want a UN blue hat force, he restated, because the Chadian Government did not want to provoke either Sudan or Libya into instigating additional problems in Chad. He noted that the mixed Chadian/Sudanese roving patrols along their mutual border, as agreed to in the Tripoli Accords, had never been implemented. He hoped that the proposed UN/AU hybrid force agreed to in Addis Ababa would help alleviate the problem of cross-border rebel activity. ¶5. (C) The Chadians were making progress in establishing democratic institutions, Allam-Mi asserted; and the process would go back to "zero" if the rebels took control. He asked that the United States condemn the current rebel attack as it had previous rebel incursions. He also asked for unspecified additional aid for the Chadian army. ¶6. (C) Comment. Saudi Arabia hosts a sizeable community of Chadians drawn from the Kreda ethnic group, many of whose families have lived there for several generations. In a conversation later in the afternoon, the Saudi Charge d'Affairs told Poloff that during his session with Allam-Mi, the Foreign Minister had merely recapped the charge of Saudi complicity and asked the Charge to pass it on to Riyadh. The Charge said he had been surprised by the public nature of the Chadian accusation, and he believed that the GOC had nothing concrete to back it up. End comment. ¶7. (U) Tripoli minimize considered. WALL