MALAYSIA DEMURS ON WFP ESCORT REQUEST FOR SOMALIA

C O N F I D E N T I A L KUALA LUMPUR 000840 SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPT FOR PM GLANCY, PMAT/ISO AF/RSA JUN BANDO EAP/RSP AND MTS E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/21/2018 TAGS: MARR MCAP PREL MY SUBJECT: MALAYSIA DEMURS ON WFP ESCORT REQUEST FOR SOMALIA REF: A. SECSTATE 100149 ¶B. KUALA LUMPUR 832 Classified By: Political Section Chief Mark D. Clark, Reasons 1.4 b. an d d. ¶1. (C) Malaysia's Ministry of Defense (MOD) has still not responded to the possibility of Royal Malaysian Navy ships providing escort assistance to World Food Program shipments to Somalia (outlined in Ref A),September 27-October 31, in response to the DAO's approach last week (Ref B) and again on September 22. Poloff raised this request to the head of the National Security Council's maritime security division. Without explicitly saying "no" to the proposal, the NSC maritime security chief in his response today suggested that the GOM hoped to have its navy personnel back in Malaysia by the end of Ramadan (end of September). He went on to suggest, as the Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister is planning to travel to New York for UNGA, that PermReps of countries affected by piracy meet there "to harness the support from the countries in the region." ¶2. (C) Comment: We do not anticipate any positive response from Malaysia on the immediate WFP escort request. KEITH