NIGER: U.S. AMBASSADOR JANUARY 10 MEETING WITH GON

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 03 NIAMEY 000048

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NOFORN
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PARIS FOR AF WATCHER

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/14/2018
TAGS: PREL MARR PHUM ASEC PGOV NG
SUBJECT: NIGER: U.S. AMBASSADOR JANUARY 10 MEETING WITH GON
FOREIGN MINISTER

REF: A. STATE 1087

B. 07 STATE 167865

C. 07 NIAMEY 1444

D. NIAMEY 27

Classified By: Ambassador Bernadette M. Allen, Reason: 1.4 b & d


1. (C) Summary. I met with Government of Niger (GON) Foreign
Minister (FM) Mindaoudou on Thursday, January 10, 2008, and
discussed the status of Niger,s MCC Threshold Program,
security (specifically land mine incidents),human
rights-related matters(arrested journalists and military,s
killing of seven civilians),Status of Forces Agreement
(SOFA),views on Trans Sahel Counter Terrorism Partnership
(TSTCP) expansion to include Libya (in response to reftel B)
and Kosovo independence (in response to reftel A). End
Summary.

Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC)
--------------


2. (U) After providing the FM a status report on Niger,s MCC
Threshold program, based on the latest information from MCC,
I segued to discussions of security matters in Niger and
human rights issues. I emphasized that the Embassy receives
several inquiries a week either about the four journalists
(two Nigerien and two French) under arrest, the seven
civilians that were reported to have been killed by the
military and/or insecurity in Niger in general. I noted that
even this week the Embassy received inquiries about security
from an MCC team scheduled to visit before month,s end
because the MCC team members had heard about the landmine
explosion in Niamey and wanted to know whether they should
postpone or cancel the planned visit. I informed the FM that
the Embassy had recommended that the MCC proceed with its
travel plans.

Security
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3. (C) Noting concern about the January 8 landmine explosion
in Niamey that unfortunately killed a journalist (Abdou
Mahamane, the director of Niger,s first private radio
station, and seriously injured another civilian, I informed
FM that Embassy's Regional Security Office (RSO) reported
that the Nigerien officers who had received U.S. crime scene
training (the Diplomatic Security ATA course) had properly
secured the scene of the explosion and collected soil and
shrapnel samples that the RSO would send to the Federal
Bureau of Investigation for evaluation. I regretted that it
had taken far longer than anticipated to obtain demining
assistance (training and equipment),but expressed hope that
the USG would be able to provide some assistance in the near
future. I stated that the Embassy Defense Attache would
coordinate with GON military counterparts to identify needs
beyond what has already been provided by the French, so that
the USG would assistance would be value added and not
duplicate training the French already had provided.


4. (C) The FM responded that the GON appreciated the training
the USG had provided to local law enforcement and welcomed
future demining assistance as soon as possible. She said the
Mouvement des Nigeriens pour la Justice (MNJ) is responsible
for placing landmines in urban centers with the aim of
creating panic among the general population. She emphasized
that President Tandja has made it clear that the GON will not
negotiate with the MNJ, that to do so would send the wrong
signal to Nigeriens; that is, one should take up arms to get
one,s demands met. She questioned why a democratic GON
should negotiate with persons creating terror, noting that
tens of thousands of unemployed diplomaed persons have
demands too, but they don,t take up arms. She further
remarked that if arms were the best means to push for
negotiation, then the women of Niger who have learned that
due to cultural circumstances they must be patient in
securing equal rights, would be better served by taking up
arms too. She said the GON will not negotiate with armed
bandits and criminals. On the subject of Mr. Mahamane (the
killed journalist),she said he had earlier on the day of his
death conducted a training seminar for fellow members of the
media and was an innocent victim only trying to return home
when his vehicle hit the landmine. (Note. Part of
Mahamane,s seminar had been covered on the local evening
news. End note.) She also mentioned the other persons
killed by mines in other regions of Niger, said that
Nigeriens will have to take some responsibility for their own
security by being watchful for suspicious activity and

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reporting it to authorities. (Note. This relates to the
"neighborhood watch" or community vigilance groups that GON
spokesperson Ben Omar had announced on local news as a
recommendation for residents to protect themselves. End
note.)

Human Rights and the Arrested Journalists
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5. (S-NF) On the arrested journalists, the FM got a bit
defensive and prefaced her comments about the journalists by
discussing her own professional background as a
constitutional lawyer, stated she pays close attention to
human rights issues and emphasized that the GON respects
human rights. She reiterated much of what has already been
publicly stated about the Nigerien journalists, that they are
believed to have been collaborators with MNJ. As for the
French journalists, she added that international calls for
President Tandja to intercede on their behalf or to grant
them clemency was premature, that Niger is a democratic
country with a court system, not a dictatorship, thus she
questions constant pleas for the President to intercede in
some way. She said it would be inappropriate for the
President to intercede before the cases are resolved through
the court system. Further, she said she was sharing in
confidence (please protect) that only a small number of
persons in the GON (including herself) had viewed the actual
footage (with the French journalists' commentary) that the
French journalists had taken of MNJ fighters in an encounter
with the Nigerien military. She said when the information
about the footage was passed to Tandja, he became angry and
pointed out that had the journalists been killed in the gun
fight, then the GON would have been blamed for killing
journalists. She then showed me a copy of the journalists,
request to visit the southern part of the country to prepare
a story on avian influenza. She said that under such
circumstances, the French journalists should not have been
found by the military in the company of MNJ combatants. She
added that the military confiscated eight DVDs, that upon
viewing the DVDs, GON officials noted the journalists had
taken pains to leave large amounts of blank space at the
beginning and end of each disk, and had recorded footage of
the MNJ activities (including the previously mentioned gun
fight) in the middle of the DVDs. She said the attempt to
hide the footage in the middle of the DVDs made the
journalists, motives suspect, especially since they were not
supposed to be in the North in the first place.

Seven civilians killed
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6. (C) On the case of the seven civilians killed (ref C) by
the military (including one of the wealthy businessmen who
owned Agharous mineral water company, Sidaghamar Ibrahim),
she said Ibrahim was a close friend of President Tandja, even
a major funder of a project in the President,s Special
Program. She said the GON (especially the President) wants
to get to the bottom of what happened, that she knows that
the party did not stick to the original travel plan it had
filed with the Nigerien military, and that the group
reportedly phoned a certain Michel Ange to request MNJ
clearance to travel. She says it remains a mystery why the
group felt a need to phone MNJ contacts and the GON does not
know why the MNJ advised the party to take a route different
from the one filed with the GON. She said given the
insecurity in the North, everyone knows that anything could
happen in that region. Using the diplomatic corps as an
example, she said when an Embassy notes the travel plan for
Ambassadors to various regions in country, she presumes there
are no sudden changes of course or deviations from the plan
forwarded to the GON. She repeated that Tandja was saddened
by the loss of a close friend.

Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA)
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7. (S) I turned to the status of the GON review of the draft
SOFA that had been deposited with the MFA Secretary General
(during the FM,s absence) at a meeting with MFA and DOD
elements last Fall. The FM inquired whether the SOFA was a
revisit of Article 98. When informed that the SOFA was not
the same as Article 98, she then asked the Americas Desk
Interim Director (Housseini) what he could tell her about the
SOFA draft, as she was not aware it had been deposited at the
MFA. He replied that he and the SecGen had yet to bring the
matter to the FM,s attention because they were still
reviewing it at the working level and planning to inform her

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about the draft later. The FM was none too pleased about
Housseini's response and scolded him by pointing out that
even if he, the SecGen and others were still reviewing the
matter that they should have at least informed her that the
document had been deposited. She informed Housseini that if
Tandja had raised the SOFA matter with her and she didn,t
know anything about it, she would have been placed in a
difficult position. She then thanked me for the
clarification about SOFA, especially the confirmation that it
is not a reiteration of Article 98. (Comment. This further
confirms that obtaining an Article 98 agreement under
Mindaoudou's watch is highly unlikely. End comment.) She
appeared open to reviewing a SOFA and I then offered to
provide her with a list of the countries with which the USG
has a SOFA (provided to the FM later in the day). I
emphasized that I could not provide copies of any partner's
SOFA with the U.S., but noted all the SOFAs have core
elements, that it is the negotiation that determines the
final contents of a SOFA between governments. The FM then
instructed Husseini to make certain the draft SOFA arrived on
her desk by day,s end, apologized to me for the mixup and
said she,d look over the draft and discuss it with relevant
parties within the GON (mainly military officials and
President Tandja.)

TSTCP

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8. (S) I informed the FM that the Dept of State was surveying
TSTCP countries, leadership (civilian and military) as to

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whether Libya should be brought into the fold and, if yes,
how much and at what pace. The FM said she would raise the
matter with Tandja, but in her own view, she couldn,t see
how efforts to counter terrorism in the region could proceed
without including Libya. She opined that Libya should
probably be included in a measured pace, not made an
immediate full partner. She emphasized that her opinion may
not be consistent with Tandja,s opinion, that she,d try to
get an answer to me by COB January 14, since she already has
a meeting scheduled with him on that date to discuss other
matters. I also noted we were interested in the military
leadership's view, that I had asked the DATT to make
inquiries as well.

Closure of meeting.
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9. (C) I closed the meeting with my delivery of the demarche
on Kosovo (ref A and D). FM indicated the GON will likely
follow suit with the majority of UN member states, as it has
no particular views on Kosovo.


10. (SBU) FM concluded with an inquiry as to whether I,d be
in Niamey later in the month because she plans to invite the
diplomatic corps to meet with her to discuss security and
other matters of possible general interest, and that she
intended to ask President Tandja to participate. She said
she hoped to schedule the meeting after her return from
ECOWAS meetings this month and prior to the AU Summit
scheduled at month,s end.
ALLEN