JAPANESE ADVOCACY FOR IAEA CANDIDATE, UPCOMING

C O N F I D E N T I A L TOKYO 000046 SENSITIVE SIPDIS DEPT FOR EAP/J, IO/T, ISN/MNSA, ISN/NESS DEPT PLEASE PASS DOE FOR NE-6 ED MCGUINESS, PI JULIA BISCONTI, NA-24 A. SCHIENMAN AND R. GOOREVICH E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/08/2018 TAGS: AORC PREL IAEA KNNP SF PARM MNUC ENRG TRGY NRR, JA SUBJECT: JAPANESE ADVOCACY FOR IAEA CANDIDATE, UPCOMING SEMINAR IN VIENNA REF: A. VIENNA 00002 ¶B. HICKS-DRESSER-CARNAHAN EMAIL 1/08 Classified By: Ambassador J. Thomas Schieffer for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) ¶1. (U) This message contains an action request, please see para 6. ¶2. (SBU) Post appreciates reftel readout from Vienna on the IAEA DG election. In a discussion which touched on this issue, Econoff met with Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) Nonproliferation, Science, and Nuclear Energy Division Deputy Director Naoto Ito and Special Assistant for Nuclear Issues Toshio Kaneko January 7. Discussion centered on MOFA's work regarding the candidacy of Ambassador Yukiya Amano for the position of IAEA Director General, and on an upcoming seminar to be hosted by the Japanese mission in Vienna. ¶3. (C) Ito and Kaneko noted they are spending the majority of their time working on Amano's candidacy. They commented that the letter (ref A) from Board Chair Feroukhi identifying Amano and Minty as the sole candidates had come as a relief and as a small surprise, as they had been very concerned about the emergence of other candidates. Now that the consultation phase is beginning, MOFA will conduct intense advocacy efforts focused on the 35 members of the IAEA Board of Governors. Ito jokingly noted it is a good thing they have many foreign language speakers on staff, as they "have a lot of letters to write". ¶4. (SBU) After discussing the DG election, Kaneko commented that Japan's mission in Vienna is planning to host a January 26 "Seminar on the Global Fuel Supply" with the support of the IAEA Secretariat. He said Japan intends to invite delegations from all IAEA member countries, and specifically pointed out that this would include Iran. The seminar will focus on the front end of the nuclear supply chain and will be open to the media. MOFA intends to make all of the seminar's material publicly available. Although some speakers are still being arranged, currently scheduled presenters include the IAEA, the OECD, and a variety of industry representatives. ¶5. (C) Kaneko provided a draft schedule for the seminar which Post has e-mailed to DOE, EAP/J and ISN/NESS for passage to appropriate officers in Vienna. He noted the U.S. Mission in Vienna had not yet been provided a copy of the schedule, but MOFA hopes to provide a final draft soon. In describing the document, Kaneko said because issues of nuclear supply are so sensitive to some countries, Japan is making an active effort to avoid using controversial terms such as "assurances of supply" or "supplier states," and rather is trying to use generic terms like "market trends". Nonproliferation, Science, and Nuclear Energy Division Director Ichikawa will head the Japanese delegation, and Ambassador Nakane will act as Chairperson. ¶6. (SBU) Action request: Please provide guidance regarding the U.S. position on the DG election for use in Tokyo with GOJ officials. Also, if possible, Post would appreciate a copy of the guidance requested in ref A. SCHIEFFER