C O N F I D E N T I A L PARIS 005667

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR ISN/MNSA; GENEVA FOR CD AND USUN FOR POL

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/25/2016
TAGS: PARM KNNP MARR PREL UN FR
SUBJECT: FRENCH UPDATE ON CENTRAL ASIAN NUCLEAR-WEAPON-FREE
ZONE DEMARCHES

REF: STATE 139268

Classified By: Charge d'Affaires, a.i. Josiah Rosenblatt, Reason 1.4 B/
D


1. (C) On August 24, we delivered reftel demarche to Arnaud
Mentre, MFA nonproliferation officer responsible for the
Central Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (CANWFZ) issue.
Mentre responded that France was involved in three demarches,
either underway or planned, on CANWFZ:

-- Today, on August 24 at 17:00 in Paris and 16:00 in London,
the French and the British MFAs plan to call in
representatives from Central Asian embassies to obtain an
explanation of their planned CANWFZ, while referring them to
the text agreed among the UK, France and the U.S. In Paris,
the Director for Strategic Affairs plans to meet with the
CDAs of the Kazhak and Turkmeni embassies and an
as-yet-unknown official from the Uzbek embassy. According to
Mentre, the MFA understood from ISN that Washington would
also make a similar demarche with Washington-based Central
Asian embassies.


2. (C) Mentre said agreement had been reached in New York on
a planned second, joint demarche to be made, in principle, by
France, the UK and the U.S. with UN Deputy Secretary-general
Mark Brown on the CANWFZ. He noted, however, that France
understood the U.S. might choose to make its own demarche, as
it also had other issues to raise with Brown.


3. (C) Lastly, the MFA is awaiting confirmation from its
mission in New York on whether the U.S., France, and the UK
have agreed on a third joint demarche to be made to the
Chinese and Russian missions next week. The objective would
be to see whether the Russians and Chinese agree with our
(U.S./France/UK) proposed text and whether they would agree
to a joint P-5 demarche in Central Asian capitals.

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

Rosenblatt