OMAN REITERATES COMMITMENT TO ELIMINATE OUTDATED

UNCLAS MUSCAT 000251 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS STATE FOR NEA/ARP, NEA/RA STATE PASS USTR FOR JBUNTIN COMMERCE FOR ITA THOFFMAN, PASS TO ANTI-BOYCOTT COMPLIANCE OFFICE E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: ETRD ECON PREL MU SUBJECT: OMAN REITERATES COMMITMENT TO ELIMINATE OUTDATED ARAB LEAGUE BOYCOTT LANGUAGE ¶1. (U) This is an action request; please see paragraph 8. -------------- Summary -------------- ¶2. (U) Omani officials reiterated their commitment to eliminate the use of outdated boycott language during meetings with officials from the Department of Commerce's (DOC) Anti-boycott Compliance Office. The Embassy will work with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry to follow-up on future boycott-related incidents reported to the DOC. End Summary. -------------- Pledge to Work Together -------------- ¶3. (SBU) On March 15, Department of Commerce Anti-boycott Compliance officials Ned Weant and Frederick Davidson, accompanied by NEA Regional Affairs officer Joe Scovitch and Econoff, met with Dr. Said al-Riyami, Economic Expert, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, and Rashid al-Maskary, Technical Expert, Oman Tender Board, to discuss the recent increase in prohibited boycott request language reported by U.S. companies. (Note: Prohibited requests, while still relatively few in number, rose from 11 in 2006 to 26 in 2007. End Note.) Riyami reaffirmed that Oman did not have any boycott laws in effect, and referred to a 2006 letter from Commerce and Industry Maqbool bin Ali Sultan to his cabinet colleagues reminding them of this fact. He further pledged to work with the DOC and the Embassy to address the continued presence of outdated language in tender documents. ¶4. (SBU) Maskary added that the Tender Board would look into its standard tender templates to ensure that outdated boycott language did not appear in its documents. He cautioned, however, that the private sector was outside the purview of the government, and therefore was at liberty to exclude potential clients who had business dealings with Israel. DOC officials responded that since prohibited requests by the private sector generally referred to outdated Omani boycott regulations, the government had a duty to remind them that such language was no longer valid. ¶5. (SBU) A follow-on meeting with Counselor Hamid bin Saif al-Rawahi, Deputy Chief of the Economic and Technical Cooperation Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, drew a similar commitment to ensure that U.S. commerce is not impeded by the presence of outdated boycott language in tenders. Rawahi said that his office would lend necessary assistance in communicating with colleagues in the Ministry of Commerce and Industry regarding the presence of such language. -------------- Outdated Language the Culprit -------------- ¶6. (SBU) Anti-boycott officials also met with Mahmoud al-Fori, Head of Procurement at Sultan Qaboos University Hospital (SQUH),an entity responsible for 10 of the 26 prohibited requests in 2007. Fori expressed surprise that documentation used for hospital tenders had included boycott language, especially in light of the fact that the hospital had discontinued the use of such terminology in 1996. He added that in 2006, the hospital's president was reminded by Commerce and Industry Maqbool bin Ali Sultan via memo that Oman had no boycott laws in effect. M. Krishna, the hospital's pharmaceutical purchasing agent, confirmed that SQUH had not used boycott language in over nine years, and that it even purchased pharmaceuticals from Israeli company Teva through its London agent. Fori concluded that private sector agents had been responsible for providing the wrong documentation, and stated that the hospital would investigate future boycott-related reports brought to its attention. ¶7. (U) Following their meeting at SQUH, the U.S. officials consulted with Habib Hanna, Country Manager for NCR Corporation, which reported the presence of boycott language in tender documents supplied by Omantel, the government's fixed-line monopoly carrier. (Note: Anti-boycott officials received a commitment from Omantel's Vice President for Corporate Affairs in 2005 to discontinue the use of outdated boycott language. End Note.) Hanna surmised that Omantel was, on occasion, using outdated tender documents. He noted that when he had suggested the use of alternative text, Omantel was more than willing to accept it. He agreed to bring subsequent findings of boycott language to the attention of the Embassy for action. -------------- Action Request -------------- ¶8. (SBU) The results of the meetings reported above show that continued use of boycott language in Oman has been the result of entities using outdated versions of tender documents. Given the firm commitment provided by Omani officials to follow-up on future incidents, Embassy requests that the DOC's Office of Anti-boycott Compliance send documentation in support of complaints to the Economic/Commercial Officer via email, so that s/he may coordinate appropriate action with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Current Embassy point of contact is Economic/Commercial Officer Brian Grimm, who can be reached at GrimmBM@state.gov. GRAPPO