UZBEKISTAN INTERESTED IN JOINING GLOBAL INITIATIVE

UNCLAS TASHKENT 000682 SIPDIS SENSITIVE DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/CEN E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PTER KNNP KGIT UZ SUBJECT: UZBEKISTAN INTERESTED IN JOINING GLOBAL INITIATIVE TO COMBAT NUCLEAR TERRORISM REF: A. SECSTATE 61227 ¶B. TASHKENT 662 ¶1. (SBU) On June 16, Ambassador Norland and the Russian Deputy Chief of Mission met with officials from Uzbekistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs--including Durbek Amanov, Head of the Department for the UN and International Organizatations and Ismat Fayzullaev, Chief of the Americas Desk--to follow up on the June 11 diplomatic note encouraging Uzbekistan to join the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism and informing it of the ongoing meeting in Madrid, Spain. Amanov indicated that Uzbekistan supports the initiative and would like to participate, but wants to receive further procedural information on how to join. One of Uzbekistan's Embassy officials in Spain had tried to participate in the meeting, he claimed, but was turned away. Although Uzbekistan is not yet a fully-fledged member of the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism, Post recommends that the Government of Uzbekistan be allowed to participate in this meeting, even if only as an observer. ¶2. (U) Uzbekistan also recently ratified the related International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism (which the Global Initiative builds upon), according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website. President Karimov approved the law on April 9, 2008, concurrently making several announcements indicating the following: on Paragraph 4 Article 7 of the Convention, the National Security Service should receive all information indicated in Article 7; on Paragraph 3 Article 9, Uzbekistan has jurisdiction with regard to acts recognized as crimes in accordance with Article 2; on Article 16, the provisions of the article should be used in order to provide punishment corresponding to crimes falling under the scope of the Convention, without damaging the effectiveness of international cooperation on issues of extradition and legal assistance; on Paragraph 2 Article 23, Uzbekistan does not consider itself bound to the provisions of Paragraph 1 Article 23. NORLAND