BOSNIA TO BACK OFF ON REQUEST FOR NATO MAP AT

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 SARAJEVO 000125 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/29/2019 TAGS: PREL MARR BK SUBJECT: BOSNIA TO BACK OFF ON REQUEST FOR NATO MAP AT APRIL SUMMIT REF: A. SARAJEVO 79 B. 2008 SARAJEVO 1656 C. JONES - FOOKS EMAIL 01/26/09 Classified By: Amb. Charles English for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (C) Summary. Foreign Minister Sven Alkalaj told Ambassador, January 29, that Bosnia would act on our advice and not send a formal letter requesting that the Alliance approve Bosnia for a NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) at its upcoming summit in April. Bosnia's ministers and members of the Tri-Presidency have publicly raised the prospect that Bosnia would receive MAP at the 2009 NATO summit ever since NATO's 2008 decision inviting Bosnia to participate in Intensified Dialogue (ID). Although Bosnia's NATO Coordination Team asserts that they have fulfilled 85 percent of the items in their Individual Partnership Action Plan (IPAP),they have made little or no progress on the most important and most difficult reforms called for by the document. End Summary. FM ALKALAJ FRUSTRATED ABOUT LACK OF U.S. SUPPORT FOR MAP -------------- -------------- ¶2. (C) At a January 29 meeting with the Ambassador, Alkalaj was clearly frustrated that the U.S. believed it was premature for Bosnia to ask the Alliance to admit it to MAP at its April 2009 summit (Ref A). Nevertheless, he accepted that it would be foolish for Bosnia to pursue MAP without a green light from the U.S. Alkalaj urged us not to link our decision regarding Bosnia's qualifications for MAP with decisions regarding the MAP applications from other NATO aspirants. Alkalaj feared the U.S. and other allies were reluctant to support Bosnia's bid for MAP because of concerns that this would hurt the prospects for Georgia and Ukraine to secure MAP at the April summit. (COMMENT: Alkalaj's comments underscore a common perception in Bosnia that Bosnia's progress towards NATO depends more on political lobbying than on making the reforms necessary to show that Bosnia could be a capable member of the Alliance. END COMMENT.) ¶3. (C) The Ambassador stressed that Bosnia's failure to complete critical reforms was the reason the U.S. believes that it was not ready for MAP. For example, the Ambassador stressed the need to provide for state-level ownership of defense property and pass the last of EUFOR's security competencies to competent state level control -- both of which are outlined in Bosnia's IPAP documents. The Ambassador also reminded Alkalaj that Bosnia's IPAP documents had only been approved in August 2008. Alkalaj responded that Bosnia had met 85 percent of the objectives described in its IPAP, but acknowledged that little progress has been made in key areas, and urged us to remind other Bosnian political leaders of the negative effects that the current political stalemate was having on Bosnia's Euro-Atlantic prospects. The MFA's point person on NATO, who was also present for the Alkalaj meeting, conceded to us privately that Bosnia had loaded up the IPAP with meaningless achievable items like "prepare drafts of key documents," so that a high level of compliance could easily be accomplished, even if progress on more important reforms stalled, which has been the case. MOD AND PRESIDENCY REACTION -------------- ¶4. (C) The Ambassador also called Minister of Defense Selmo Cikotic to deliver the same message, and we discussed the issue at lower levels with the cabinets of Bosnia's Tri-Presidency. Cikotic made a brief press statement that the Ministry had received messages from NATO that the Alliance was not ready to give Bosnia a MAP, and added a comment that Georgia and Ukraine may take precedence for the Allies (something that the Ambassador did not mention at all). We approached the Presidency cabinets, because the MFA had already asked the Presidency to approve a letter to the NATO SYG formally requesting MAP, which had been put on the Presidency's January 29 agenda. The cabinet of Bosniak member of the Presidency Haris Silajdzic, having just met with Alkalaj after the latter's conversation with the Ambassador, strongly criticized what they viewed as a lack of U.S. support for Bosnia's NATO aspirations. They argued that Bosnia needed constant progress towards NATO to keep it together, not that Bosnia deserved MAP because it had proved it could be a productive member of the Alliance. They also demanded to know who in the State Department had made the decision SARAJEVO 00000125 002 OF 002 ¶5. (C) An official from the cabinet of Bosnian-Serb member of Presidency Nebojsa Radmanovic, who said the decision was no surprise, told us later that during the Presidency session Silajdzic suggested sending the letter against our advice, arguing that doing so would force the U.S. -- "at higher levels of the State Department" -- to support Bosnia's application for fear of embarrassing Bosnia and undermining public support for NATO. As Chairman of the Presidency, Radmanovic took the issue off the agenda and issued the Presidency statement which said that Bosnia had chosen not to submit the letter because the timing was wrong and the upcoming summit was largely ceremonial in nature. COMMENT -------------- ¶6. (C) While we support the enthusiasm of Bosnia's leaders for Euro-Atlantic integration, we continue to emphasize that the NATO accession process is merit-based, and Bosnia's performance on its reform agenda will be the key factor determining its success getting MAP. Continuing down the Euro-Atlantic path remains critical for Bosnia, but it is also critical that they understand this goes hand-in-hand with realizing their reform agenda. ENGLISH