PORTUGUESE ON S-FM MEETING, ISAF, AFRICA, AND

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 LISBON 000226

NOFORN
SIPDIS

KABUL FOR COS USFOR-A

E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/21/2019
TAGS: PREL PGOV MARR MOPS CVIS XA ZK AF PO
SUBJECT: PORTUGUESE ON S-FM MEETING, ISAF, AFRICA, AND
BILATERAL CONCERNS

LISBON 00000226 001.2 OF 003


Classified By: DEPUTY POL/ECON COUNSELOR TROY FITRELL FOR REASONS 1.4 (
b, d)


1. (C/NF) Summary. Portuguese MFA Political Director and his
advisers met with Ambassador Stephenson April 21 to discuss a
range of issues in advance of the Portugal-U.S. Bilateral
Commission meeting scheduled for May 4. The Portuguese are
pleased to have confirmation for FM Amado's meeting with
Secretary Clinton, and hope to add Gen. Jones to the list as
well. Amado will invite Secretary Clinton to Lisbon for the
Community of Democracies ministerial in July and even offered
to shift the dates of the ministerial if they conflicted with
the Secretary's other commitments. The Portuguese will
double ISAF personnel deployments but cannot yet confirm what
form those contributions will take, as they have not yet
cleared it with President Cavaco Silva. To accept Guantanamo
detainees, the Portuguese need dossiers on the detainees in
question, without which they cannot act. The Portuguese
expect to confirm participation in the near future to engage
on the Combating Serious Crime watch list and HSPD-6. End
summary.


2. (U) In advance of the May 4 Portugal-U.S. Bilateral
Commission meeting, Portuguese MFA Political Director Nuno
Brito, Deputy Director Rui Maciera, Americas Desk Officer
Francisco Alegre, MOD Policy Director Paulo Vizeu Pinheiro,
and MOD Bilateral Programs Officer Bernardo Calheiro joined
Ambassador Stephenson and his team for lunch on April 21 to
discuss a range of issues of mutual concern.

FM AMADO TO MEET S IN WASHINGTON, HOPEFULLY IN LISBON
-------------- --------------

3. (C/NF) Pol Dir Brito was pleased that a meeting between FM
Amado and Secretary Clinton was confirmed for June 4 in
Washington. Brito noted that Amado will also call on members
of Congress and hopes to get confirmation on a meeting with
National Security Adviser Gen. Jones. Brito also noted that
Amado intends to write a letter to Secretary Clinton to
invite her to the Community of Democracies ministerial
meeting scheduled for Lisbon July 10-11. Brito noted that
Secretary Clinton's attendance was a priority for the
Portuguese and that Portugal would shift the dates in case of
a conflict with Secretary Clinton's schedule.

ISAF AND NATO
--------------

4. (C/NF) Brito recalled Prime Minister Socrates' words at
the NATO Summit, when Socrates spoke of doubling Portugal's
contributions to the International Security Assistance Force
(ISAF) in Afghanistan. Neither Brito nor the MOD
representatives could confirm what the increased
contributions would be as the GOP had not finished its review
of options or presented its plans to the National Defense
Council and President Cavaco Silva. Brito confirmed,
however, that the contributions would be to fill "an
operational need."


5. (C/NF) Regarding current commitments, Vizeu Pinheiro noted
that Portugal's second OMLT had been held up by bureaucratic
delays, possibly due to flight clearances, but that the MOD
expected it to deploy "soon." He added that the promised
medical unit was expected to deploy in mid-June. Maciera
confirmed that Portugal will take command of the Euro
Gendarmerie in July, but Brito was quick to note that he did
not expect Portugal to commit anything more than a token
presence of 10-15 national guardsmen to any gendarmerie force
for ISAF. Rising crime in Portugal, he posited, was a
critical political issue at home, so sending police overseas
was not viable in an election year.


6. (C/NF) Switching to Portugal's hosting of the 2010 NATO
Summit, Brito joked that it would be in just one location,
avoiding the logistical nightmare of Strasbourg/Kehl. Brito
noted he wished to maintain a close dialog with Washington

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offices to ensure that the summit is productive.

GTMO, COMBATING SERIOUS CRIME, AND HSPD-6
--------------

7. (C/NF) Brito reviewed recent developments in the
resettlement of Guantanamo Bay detainees, noting that the GOP
still needed profiles and dossiers of the detainees that we
hoped the GOP would accept. On the larger European Union
front, Brito opined that the Czech government was paralyzed
and suggested we begin to engage Sweden more actively in
advance of the Swedish EU presidency. Alegre added that,
while the recent EU visit to Washington was successful, the
EU was far from a common position exacerbated by Schengen
concerns.


8. (C/NF) Maciera volunteered that the GOP was aware that it
owed Washington a response on the Combating Serious Crime
watch list and the HSPD-6 initiatives, for each of which
teams from Washington recently visited Lisbon. Maciera said
the MFA would have a response on the watch list soon and that
the interagency review on HSPD-6 was also close to completion.

AFRICA
--------------

9. (C/NF) Brito said Amado will travel to Luanda tomorrow for
a conference of all Portuguese ambassadors on the continent.
Guinea-Bissau is Amado's chief concern, believing that
upcoming elections there are critical to establish legitimacy
of the Bissau government. Vizeu Pinheiro added that
demobilizing the army, paying veterans, and "refreshing" the
military into becoming a multi-ethnic institution are the
pressing issues from the Portuguese MOD perspective.


10. (C/NF) Vizeu Pinheiro said the MOD is ready to engage in
trilateral cooperation activities with the U.S. Africa
Command and African partners, but that such projects must be
developed jointly with the U.S., Portugal, and the African
partner involved from the beginning. Joining existing U.S.
projects, he continued, was not an option. He said demining,
water, and HIV/AIDS were projects in which the MOD was
interested and that they await any proposals Africa Command
might wish to make.

BILATERAL MILITARY ISSUES
--------------

11. (C/NF) Brito was particularly interested in the
long-standing and frustrating impasse on the salary disputes
for the U.S. Air Force's Portuguese workers at Lajes Air Base
in the Azores. He was pleased to learn the U.S. and
Portuguese delegations have agreed on a compromise text, but
Ambassador Stephenson cautioned that we are still dependent
on Congressional approval for the appropriation of the
disputed funds. Brito noted that FM Amado hoped to announce
resolution of the issue during his June visit to the U.S.


12. (C/NF) Vizeu Pinheiro told us that longstanding issues
regarding hangar destruction, runway resurfacing, and an
airspace training initiative at Lajes were near completion.
The hangar issue, he said, was resolved in favor of our
demolition plan. The runway plan was currently at the MOD's
Director General for Infrastructure, but that they hoped to
be finished before the May 4 meeting. The airspace training
initiative was at the Ministry of Transportation, awaiting
that ministry's counsel on the effect on civil aviation, but
that the MOD expected completion of this review before the
May 4 meeting as well. Vizeu Pinheiro also said that he
thought that the training initiative's environmental impact
study had been completed and no troubling issues had been
noted.


13. (C/NF) Vizeu Pinheiro reiterated recent frustration with
the surprise increase in pilot training costs for Portuguese
flight candidates in the U.S. on foreign military sales
contract training. He repeatedly stressed that they had

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signed a Letter of Offer and Agreement based on a certain
price and were stunned to discover a 33 percent price
increase mid-way through the program. We assured him that we
were looking into both the specific situation of the cost
increase and the general concern of how best to support
Portuguese flight training without the total dependence
Portugal has had on U.S. Air Force training facilities.

VISITING UZBEKISTAN, TAJIKISTAN, AND EGYPT
--------------

14. (C/NF) Brito said he accompanied Amado on his trip to
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Egypt, preceding Assistant
Secretary Boucher in Tajikistan by one day and crossing paths
with Special Envoy Mitchell in Cairo. In Tajikistan, Brito
said the Tajiks told him they had once offered the use of a
military air base to NATO or the U.S. but were less inclined
to do so now. Brito recognized, however, that what he was
told may have become out of date by A/S Boucher's subsequent
meetings. Brito noted that the Prime Minister Socrates has a
personal interest in the Middle East and the GOP hopes to use
its long-standing connections in the region to further issues
of mutual interest.

COMMENT
--------------

15. (C/NF) Other GOP sources tell us the additional ISAF
contributions would be a return of a Quick Reaction Force
embedded with the British in Helmand Province, but Brito
would not confirm this. On Guantanamo, the Portuguese offer
is genuine, as is their need to reach an EU agreement, but
nothing will happen without dossiers on each detainee to be
resettled. On African cooperation, Vizeu Pinheiro himself is
genuine about wanting to cooperate with Africa Command, but
awaiting project proposals that must be developed from
scratch is the MOD's institutional method of avoiding action.
Africa Command is better off concentrating on Portugal's
Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Interior, which are
genuinely eager to act in concert with us in Africa, or
working bilaterally with lusophone African partners as a way
of spurring Portuguese participation.


For more reporting from Embassy Lisbon and information about Portugal,
please see our Intelink site:

http://www.intelink.sgov.gov/wiki/portal:port ugal

STEPHENSON