(C) UK EMBASSY UPDATE ON KHADDAM TRAVEL TO UK,

C O N F I D E N T I A L PARIS 003482

SIPDIS

NOFORN

E.O. 12958: DECL: 5/22/2016
TAGS: PREL PGOV PINR UK SY FR
SUBJECT: (C) UK EMBASSY UPDATE ON KHADDAM TRAVEL TO UK,
RESIDENCY IN FRANCE (C-NE6-00262)

REF: PARIS 2609

Classified By: Acting Political Counselor Bruce Turner, reasons 1.4 (b)
and (d).


1. (C/NF) UK Embassy First Secretary Tom Fletcher (protect
throughout) updated poloff May 19 on the planned travel of
former Syrian Vice-President Abdel Halim Khaddam to the UK,
which has now been postponed to the last week of May/first
week of June. Fletcher reported that Khaddam had delayed his
UK travel slightly to take more time to organize an
opposition conference (NFI) and media meetings in the UK, and
that the UK would issue him an amended visa to accommodate
the new dates.


2. (C/NF) Fletcher reported a tense exchange he had a few
weeks earlier with a senior advisor in the French Interior
Ministry (MOI),who had called Fletcher to complain about
delays in facilitating the return to the UK by one of
Khaddam's grandsons, who was stuck in France after losing his
Syrian passport, which had contained his student visa for the
UK (reftel). Fletcher reported that the French Interior
Ministry official told him that President Chirac had ordered
Interior Minister Sarkozy to regularize immediately the
status of Khaddam's 19-member family entourage in France, by
issuing them long-term residency cards ("carte sejour"),
without requiring them to seek refugee status. The MOI
official claimed that the one grandson who had lost his
passport did not want French residency and only wanted to
return to the UK, which in turn was delaying the residency
cards for the entire Khaddam family. Fletcher told the
French MOI official that the UK was ready to issue a new visa
to the Khaddam grandson, but would do so only when he was
able to present a passport. The MOI official described the
UK response as unacceptable, and warned that the issue could
escalate to become a bilateral problem between the UK and
France. For his part, Fletcher said he was instructed by the
FCO to respond to the French MOI by stating categorically
that the UK had no interest in supporting Khaddam, wanted
nothing to do with him as an individual, and would not make
exceptions to basic visa issuance requirements to facilitate
his grandson's return to the UK.


3. (C/NF) Fletcher reported that the issue was resolved once
the Khaddam grandson was able to acquire a Jordanian
passport, by unknown means, which allowed the UK to reissue
his student visa. The Khaddam family apparently had
attempted to acquire Saudi and Lebanese passports for the
grandson in question, without success. Fletcher added that
as a result of the episode, Jamal Khaddam, father of the
grandson/student seeking to return to the UK, had become his
"new best friend" and was seeking to introduce him to the
family. Fletcher commented that Jamal appeared to be the
leader among Khaddam's Paris-based family entourage.


4. (C/NF) Comment: This highly credible report is the first
we've heard of the GoF regularizing Khaddam's residency in
France. It suggests that the GoF has overcome its initial
reticence over Khaddam's presence in France and has settled
comfortably into an arrangement by which he travels freely in
and out of France and practices his very public anti-Syria
opposition activity outside French territory, with the tacit
backing of President Chirac. End comment.


Please visit Paris' Classified Website at:
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/paris/index.c fm

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