DPKO ON UNMIK TRANSITION: WE ARE LEAVING, WHERE'S

C O N F I D E N T I A L USUN NEW YORK 000706

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/06/2018
TAGS: PREL PGOV UNMIK
SUBJECT: DPKO ON UNMIK TRANSITION: WE ARE LEAVING, WHERE'S
EULEX?

Classified By: Ambassador Alejandro Wolff for Reasons 1.4 B/D.


1. (C) SUMMARY AND ACTION REQUEST. Senior UN officials
insist to USUN that UNMIK is on track for a minimum 70
percent drawdown by October, 2008. They say further drawdown
this year or next depends on EULEX willingness to deploy
because the UN and EU have agreed that UNMIK will not
withdraw from Serb-majority areas until EULEX is ready to
deploy in them. DPKO claims to have offered EULEX whatever
UN facilities it wants and professes bewilderment as to why
EULEX has yet to deploy a single police officer. DPKO offers
USUN a one-time reading of the final reconfiguration plan.
USUN invites Department's articulation of particular
reconfiguration concerns for reference during that session.
See action request para 5. END SUMMARY AND ACTION REQUEST.


2. (C) Deputy SYG Chief of Staff Kim Won-soo and DPKO's
Director for Europe David Harland (protect both) recently
told Ambassador Wolff and DepPolCouns, respectively, that
UNMIK has launched a 120-day drawdown that would leave the
mission at 70 percent or less of its June 28 strength. Kim
said that Nick Haysom of the Secretary-General's office would
serve as Principal Deputy SRSG in Pristina for August,
focusing on reconfiguration implementation, and be replaced
for the month of September by Harland. Another New York DPKO
staff member would replace Harland in October. (Harland is
hopeful that a longer-term PDSRSG will be appointed before he
has to report to Pristina.)


3. (C) Kim and Harland separately insisted that the 70
percent drawdown aspect of UNMIK's reconfiguration is broadly
unrelated to EULEX's deployment and entered a 120-day
implementation phase upon receipt of a code cable from New
York on June 28. Harland said UNMIK residual presence would
be largely in Kosovo Serb-majority areas where the UN and EU
had agreed that UNMIK would not redeploy until EULEX is fully
ready to deploy. He expressed great frustration at EULEX's
failure to date to deploy and warned that we are stumbling
into a "partition by organization" that may leave UNMIK in
Serb areas and EULEX in Albanian areas. He had though high
praise for EULEX head Yves de Kermabon, who he said was
himself frustrated with Brussels's lack of organization.
Harland ridiculed what he said were still technically the
EU's "operating presumptions" regarding EULEX -- a Security
Council resolution, Belgrade's cooperation, and UMMIK
turnkeying its entire operation over to EULEX. He quoted
with approval Karl Bildt's comment that these presumptions
had been from the outset "laughably stupid."


4. (C) On UNMIK-EULEX transition discussions, Harland said
significant progress was being made and defended the UN's
spirit of cooperation which he said included a recent offer,
accepted by EULEX, to put the SRSG's own physical office at
the disposition of EULEX. He said EULEX, on the other hand,
seems incapable of deploying even a single police officer
until every aspect of its full deployment has been resolved.
He contrasted the Office of the Civilian Representative's
approach to deployment that included building its own
facility with EULEX's evident passivity that recently led it
to decline 120 vehicles offered by UNMIK on terms previously
negotiated. He said he had advised EULEX to begin deployment
in Kosovo's southeast, largely untouched by the war, as a
confidence-building measure but had little hope deployment
would begin anywhere.


5. (C) Asked for copies of the final reconfiguration plan,
Harland resisted, saying that the UN had to be careful about
agreeing to individual UNSC member review of this document
when the UNSC's inability to provide guidance to the SYG was
the trigger Ban had cited for unilaterally ordering
reconfiguration. Harland eventually offered to allow USUN a
one-time reading of the reconfiguration plan but added that
his office would be unable to subsequently accept suggestions
from Washington or other UNSC capitals for revisions. ACTION
REQUEST: USUN would welcome Department's guidance on areas of
reconfiguration questioning for DPKO during this one-time
review of the reconfiguration plan. END ACTION REQUEST.
Wolff