NORWAY WILL NOT OPPOSE ISRAEL JUSCANZ MEMBERSHIP

C O N F I D E N T I A L OSLO 000537 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 09/03/2019 TAGS: PREL IS PHUM NO SUBJECT: NORWAY WILL NOT OPPOSE ISRAEL JUSCANZ MEMBERSHIP REF: STATE 93102 Classified By: Deputy Political/Economic Counselor Aldo Sirotic for rea sons 1.4(b) and (d) ¶1. (C) On September 2, Poloff delivered reftel points to Vebjorn Heines, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) Coordinator for Human Rights Council (HRC) issues in the MFA Humanitarian Issues section. Heines was the person referred to in reftel paragraph 10 as the former "Norwegian PolCouns in Geneva." Heines very carefully delivered a message of non-opposition to Israeli membership in the JUSCANZ consultative group at the UN ("JUSCANZ" is only a partial acronym of some of the countries in the group). His summarized comments follow: ¶2. (C) Heines said: "This is not a new issue, and has been discussed for several years. The Norwegian position in the past has been consistent--we will never stand in the way of membership for Israel in JUSCANZ. We are in the process of refining our position; it is currently being crafted and should be done by early next week. Our assessment at this stage is that JUSCANZ is closer to genuine consensus on accepting Israel into the group." ¶3. (C) Heines continued: "We want to especially emphasize the truth of one of your demarche points, that it is very important to Norway, in this decision, that JUSCANZ is not a likeminded group. We trust that the U.S. sees this the way Norway does: this is an information sharing group, not a consensus building group. With Israel's addition, we need to state clearly that it is likely that the number of issues on which JUSCANZ is not likeminded will increase, and its function as a place for strategizing will decrease. We would also like to see other countries that could be useful in JUSCANZ consultations, specifically Turkey and Ukraine, also included, but Israel's inclusion is not dependent on inclusion of those countries." ¶4. (C) Heines concluded: "Norway does want a more balanced approach in the HRC, and we will work with the U.S. to encourage a more constructive dialogue. We would caution that if Israel demonizes the HRC it will not be constructive." HEG