PALESTINIAN REPRESENTATIVE MORE OPTIMISTIC ABOUT

C O N F I D E N T I A L TOKYO 002646

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP/J AND NEA/IPA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/16/2019
TAGS: PGOV PREL EAID KPAL IS
SUBJECT: PALESTINIAN REPRESENTATIVE MORE OPTIMISTIC ABOUT
BUDGET SUPPORT

REF: TOKYO 1666

Classified By: POL M/C Robert S. Luke per reasons 1.4 (b) and d.


1. (C) In a November 16 meeting with Embassy Poloff,
Palestinian Permanent Mission Chief Representative Waleed
Siam said that he was optimistic that the new Democratic
Party of Japan (DPJ) government would be more receptive to
requests for direct budget support to the Palestinian
Authority (PA) than previous Liberal Democratic Party (LDJ)
governments had been. Siam, who has been the Palestinian
Representative in Japan since 2003, described his
relationships with Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and Foreign
Minister Katsuya Okada that date from the DPJ's time as the
opposition party, adding that Hatoyama and Okada had spoken
supportively of direct budget assistance to the PA.


2. (C) As noted in reftel, the GOJ has been reluctant to
provide direct budget support to the PA, preferring instead
to support infrastructure and development projects. In
recent years, Japan has provided limited "non-project
assistance" to the PA -- which consists of funding a
particular expense or service and paying the provider
directly. Siam said that since the September 16 change in
government, he has been meeting with DPJ politicians,
including State Secretary for Foreign Affairs (SSFA) Tetsuro
Fukuyama, a DPJ Diet Upper House member, to make the case for
direct budget support. That said, Siam conceded that
resistance to budget support among the GOJ career bureaucracy
is likely unchanged.


3. (C) While Siam believes that $50 million in GOJ budget
support is not unreasonable, he stressed that it should not
come at the expense of Japan's traditional economic and
development assistance. "We need it both," he said. Saim
conceded, however, that while he believes DPJ political
leaders might be more supportive of the PA, he had not yet
deciphered the DPJ's decision-making structure with respect
to assistance. "The Japanese have many pockets, and one
needs to know where to look for the money. I've not quite
figured out where all the DPJ pockets are," he said.


4. (C) COMMENT: Siam may well be correct that the DPJ could
be more receptive to PA budget support. Certainly, the DPJ's
campaign manifesto seemed to auger well for the PA, with its
thin foreign policy section containing a specific mention of
"providing more aid to Palestine through the Japan
International Cooperation Agency (JICA),Japan's development
agency." Nonetheless, the DPJ-led government's overall ODA
priorities remain unclear, and possible budget trade-offs may
be looming on the horizon. In announcing the GOJ's 5-year,
$5 billion commitment to Afghanistan on November 10,
Afghanistan and Pakistan Special Envoy Motohide Yoshikawa
admitted that there could be some impact on other ODA
priorities. In an austere GOJ budget environment and absent
new momentum in the Middle East Peace Process, the GOJ may be
reluctant to expand its commitment to the PA.

ROOS