GREECE ALREADY SUBMITTED HCOC AD, URGES U.S. TO

C O N F I D E N T I A L ATHENS 000350 SIPDIS STATE FOR ISN/MTR E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/19/2018 TAGS: PREL MNUC ETTC TSPA KSCA GR SUBJECT: GREECE ALREADY SUBMITTED HCOC AD, URGES U.S. TO SUBMIT PLNS REF: STATE 24053 Classified By: ACTING POL COUNSELOR PAUL CARTER. REASONS 1.4 (B) AND ( D). ¶1. (C) PolOff delivered reftel demarche on boosting the number of HCOC Annual Declarations (ADs) received this year to Second Counselor Loukas Tsokos and Counselor-Expert on Disarmament Issues Pantelis Margaris at the MFA D1 Directorate for UN and International Organizations. In response, Margaris stated that Greece had already submitted its AD during the week prior to the meeting and that Greece, having no nuclear weapons, honored this commitment on time annually. ¶2. (C) Tsokos and Margaris then used the opportunity to request that the U.S. begin submitting the required Pre-Launch Notifications (PLNs) after over a year of failure to do so. As a result of this delay, they observed, Russia had also stopped submitting its PLNs, causing what they believe was a stalemate in HCOC. Greece and other EU member states strongly encouraged the U.S. to begin submitting its PLNs again as there "has to be cooperation between the U.S. and Russia," according to Tsokos. Russia had asked for "certain progress" on this issue and had stated that it would not submit its PLNs until the U.S. did. According to Margaris, this issue would be the priority at the annual HCOC meeting to be held in early May. SPECKHARD