FRAUD SUMMARY - MAJURO

UNCLAS MAJURO 000087 SIPDIS DEPT FOR CA/FPP, DHS FOR CIS/FDNS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: KFRD CMGT CVIS CPAS ASEC RM SUBJECT: FRAUD SUMMARY - MAJURO REF: STATE 057623 ¶1. Fraud Summary for the Republic of the Marshall Islands per direction of STATE 057623 is provided below. a) Country Conditions: The Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) is a country which has signed a Compact of Free Association with the United States. As such, the citizens of the RMI may travel, work, and live in the United States without visas under their Compact status. Third Country Nationals are few, and generally do not travel to the United States, but do transit Guam when traveling to their home countries (China, Korea, etc). There have been no incidents of known fraud on travel to and through the United States and its territories. b) NIV Fraud: None observed c) IV Fraud: None observed, IVs are not processed in Majuro, RMI. d) DV Fraud: None observed, DV has not been used this past year in the RMI. e) ACS and U.S. Passport Fraud: None observed f) Adoption Fraud: About two adoptions are performed per month by U.S. citizens adopting Marshallese children. The adoptions are done under the auspices of the Marshallese High Court and the RMI Adoption Service. No fraud observed. g) Use of DNA Testing: None observed during the past year. h) Asylum and Other DHS Benefit Fraud: None observed. i) Alien Smuggling, trafficking, organized crime, terrorist travel: None observed or reported j) DS Criminal Fraud Investigations: None k) Host Country Passport, Identity Documents and Civil Registry: RMI Passports meet international standards and are issued for five year increments. Naturalized citizens receive a Compact Stamp in their second RMI passport after a five year period of citizenship, which then authorizes them Compact Status for travel to the United States. One possible change of a name on a RMI passport was reported in the open press about a person who was alleged to have been deported from the United States and then used his mother's maiden name to get another passport.. Post is currently asking the GRMI about its process for changing names in the passports of RMI citizens. l) Cooperation with Host Government Authorities: Host government authorities are very cooperative in all aspects of consular affairs. m) Areas of Particular Concern: Embassy Majuro is a limited consular post, and we cannot issue emergency passports or provide other needed emergency assistance to American citizens, even though we are thousands of miles away from the United States. This is a problem which needs to be solved. Recommend that CA review the status of this post, realize that it is in a foreign country, and authorize the consular officers here to provide better emergency services to our citizens, both resident and transit, by authorizing this post to have authority to issue emergency passports when required to meet our ACS responsibilities. n) Staffing and training: Embassy Majuro has three officers with valid consular commissions and one moderately trained FSN visa assistant. When one of the officers departs on leave, the consular activities are covered by the remaining officers. When the visa clerk goes on scheduled leave, we receive backfill from Embassy Manila. It would be very useful to have a better trained backup visa clerk in the event that our visa assistant is sick or for other emergency aspects of issuing visas in this remote island nation. Secondly, if Embassy Majuro is given authority to issue emergency passports, then we would require training for a passport clerk for ACS. Currently we have no ACS FSN position. CAMPBELL