WASSENAAR ARRANGEMENT: GENERAL WORKING GROUP

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 UNVIE VIENNA 000522

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E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/15/2019
TAGS: ETTC KSTC PARM
SUBJECT: WASSENAAR ARRANGEMENT: GENERAL WORKING GROUP
REPORT, OCTOBER 13-15

REF: UNVIE 308 - MAY 25-27 GENERAL WORKING GROUP REPORT

Classified By: Counselor Eric Sandberg, Reason 1.4 (d).


1. (C) Summary: The October 13-15 General Working Group
(GWG) meeting was notable for a lack of progress as a result
of Russian intransigence. Russia continued to press its
issues, primarily re-export control including language on
destabilizing accumulations of conventional arms and its
desire to have a list of candidates for Head of Secretariat
by the Plenary. It appears that the GWG will not have any
proposals for adoption by the Plenary this year, though two
proposals are still being worked intersessionally. The GWG
has not made a formal recommendation to extend for one year
the current Head of Secretariat as Russia blocked the
recommendation. End Summary

Opening Remarks


2. (C) The October GWG began with Russia requesting the
floor to make opening remarks. The Russian delegation
complained that Wassenaar is not functioning well, citing
(again) the events in Georgia in 2008 as an example of how
the Wassenaar Arrangement did not prevent a destabilizing
accumulation of conventional arms ) despite being warned
several times by Russia. Participating States were, and
continue to be, major weapons suppliers to Georgia.
Wassenaar needs to reassess its priorities; Russia's
suggestion is to have a discussion on destabilizing
accumulations.


3. (SBU) Further, the May GWG showed that Wassenaar does not
operate by consensus, since an attempt to force upon
Wassenaar a decision made by "a closed organization" occurred
at that meeting - a reference to the May GWG statement by the
Czech delegation as chair of the EU, saying EU Member States
objected to the current version of the Russian proposal for
Best Practices on Re-Export Controls. (Reftel para. 19.)
Russia suggested that Wassenaar should reflect on
prioritizing issues for the Arrangement; in Russia's view
this would be destabilizing accumulations and Re-Export
Controls.

Ad Hoc Group of Security and Intelligence Experts


4. (C) The Ad Hoc Group had its greatest number of
presentations to date, with eight countries providing papers
or presentations. Japan introduced two papers focused on the
DPRK; one looking at how North Korea was circumventing export
controls and the other at actions Japan has taken to address
North Korea's WMD development and proliferation in general.
Australia briefed on new trends in anti-armor weapon design,
noting that these weapons are designed to neutralize a
broader spectrum of targets than armored vehicles. The U.S.
updated Participating States on the small arms flow into
Yemen, noting that the flow of assault rifles has slowed, but
quantity of weapons already available in the black markets
makes Yemen a good source of weapons for terrorist groups and
other non-state actors. Germany briefed on the dangers laser
pointers represent to aircraft; France did a short paper on
Iranian exports to Sudan, Syria, and Venezuela in violation
of UNSCR 1747; and Spain presented a paper on arms
trafficking in Central America and Mexico. The Slovenian
delegation gave Participating States a heads up to a theft of
light anti-tank weapons from a storage site; they will
prepare a paper on this for the next meeting. The UK brought
to the attention of the group concerns about an increase in
the criminal use of gas alarm pistols, blank firers, and
certain types of air guns.


5. (C) Russia noted that the Ad Hoc Group was to focus on
terrorism, but many of the papers were outside that scope.
In addition, the briefing on the DPRK talked about
proliferation activities from 2002, but the first resolution
on the DPRK was not until 2006, so it was inappropriate to
talk about activities prior to 2006. Russia believes that
Participating States should keep more closely to the scope
and mandate of the group.

Regional Views


6. (C) A number of regional views were presented that ranged
around the globe. Russia again focused on arms transfers to
Georgia; the UK looked at Chinese arms transfers to Africa
and the arms flow in the Horn of Africa; Australia presented

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on Burma; the Netherlands briefed on arms acquisitions in
South America. The only comments during the meeting were
from the Russian delegation, which objected to Australia
using the phrase "proliferation" in relation to conventional
weapons; Russia said this was term specific to WMD.
Australia responded that proliferation covers programs of
concern, including military programs, which was the focus of
its paper.


7. (C) Sweden closed out the briefings on regional views by
noting that a small amount of anti-tank weapons were found in
Colombia. A check of Swedish records showed no arms
transfers to Colombia, but there was a transfer to Venezuela.
Sweden has sought an answer from Venezuela on how these
weapons could have ended up in Colombia. Sweden last
approved an export license to Venezuela in 2006; any future
requests will be scrutinized carefully and would be
influenced by the response received from Venezuela to the
query on the anti-tank weapons.

Report of the Experts Group (EG)


8. (U) The EG chair briefed on the outcomes of the Experts
Group, noting the many recommendations to be sent forward to
the Plenary for approval. The Chair reported that the EG was
unable to develop a control text for real-time virtual
radars. France suggested the GWG might discuss these systems
next year from the perspective of possibly educating industry
on how this technology could be misused.

Specific Information Exchange


9. (SBU) None of the current proposals in this category
reached consensus. The proposals are: reporting transfers of
ammunition; reporting conventional arms transfers among
Participating States; arms denial reporting; lowering the
threshold for artillery reporting; and dual-use denial
notifications. Sweden noted that work still needs to be done
on its proposal for ammunition reporting and said it will be
inviting Participating States to Stockholm in early 2010 to
discuss the proposal in an effort to speed up work. Russia's
proposal for doing intra-Wassenaar reporting (Geographic
Scope of Transparency) has not reached consensus, and has
little support. Russia's position is that this proposal
would further transparency, because the current reporting
system forces it to be more transparent than other
Participating States as most of Russia's exports are to
non-Participating States. With respect to the arms denial
reporting, Russia noted it did not see the utility of such a
mechanism, as Participating States chose not to stop arms
transfers to Georgia, even though the Russian President had
announced an arms embargo on Georgia.

Destabilizing Accumulations of Arms


10. (U) Russia proposed a questionnaire on national
practices with respect to Participating States policies on
arms transfers to conflict zones. The questionnaire was not
discussed; it is primarily a list of questions taken from the
1998 Wassenaar document on evaluating exports of conventional
arms and asks Participating States if they apply the
considerations raised by the questions when reviewing
proposed exports.

Controls, Licensing, and Enforcement


11. (U) Under the discussion of Participating States'
national policies, France noted two significant changes: one
) it asked that France be removed from the footnote in the
Initial Elements saying that the GOF took the Wassenaar
munitions list under advisement, because France now applies
the whole munitions list; two, France has now established an
office that deals solely with licenses and dual-use issues.


12. (U) The Danish proposal on Transportation of
Conventional Arms to Prevent Destabilizing Accumulations of
Arms may be the one proposal put forward to the Plenary for
approval. The U.S. has noted it needs to finish its review,
but it should be able to respond positively by the Plenary.
Germany and France still have issues with Japan's proposal
for Best Practices on Internal Compliance Programs, so it is
unlikely to be ready for approval at the Plenary.


13. (U) Russia's proposal for Best Practices on Re-Export
Controls is still under review. The countries that still

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have bilateral issues on foreign licensed production with
Russia (Poland, Bulgaria, Romania, Czech Republic, and
Slovakia) again agreed on the goals of the proposal, but all
noted they would prefer to work from the Polish edited draft,
which leaves out any reference to "licensed production."
This is a non-starter for Russia.

Re-Export Controls ) Side Discussions


14. (C) On October 13, ISN/CATR director Ann Ganzer chaired
an informal meeting on the margins of the GWG, attended by
representatives of Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, and
Romania, to exchange views regarding the 2007 Russian
proposal to control the re-export of weapons produced under
license. Delegations from former Warsaw Pact member states
are wary of the proposal, viewing it as a back-door attempt
to press Russian claims to license and control their
production of weaponry based on Soviet designs.

15. (C) The five countries, apparently joined by the EU at
the May GWG, have withheld consensus regarding the proposal
titled: Best Practices Guidelines on Subsequent Transfer
(Re-export) Controls for Conventional Weapons Systems
contained in Appendix 3 to the WA Initial Elements. They
object to language in paragraph 5 of the preamble ) "To
ensure that subsequent transfer (re-export) to third parties
of conventional weapons systems produced under license from
another country is consistent with all relevant provisions of
the formal government-to-government agreements, end-use
assurances and/or export licenses pursuant to which the
production technology was transferred." They also object to
the proposed guideline, "Participating States agree to apply
these controls to all export activities, related to
subsequent transfer (re-export) of conventional weapons
systems acquired or manufactured under foreign license
production agreements concluded and implemented after the
adoption of this document."

16. (C) The Polish representative spoke at length regarding
the status of Polish-Russian bilateral discussions on the
topic. He noted that the issue was primarily a commercial
and economic issue that needed to be settled bilaterally and
not in a political, multilateral forum like the WA. While
Poland acknowledges that its current arms production utilizes
Soviet-era designs, the designs had been extensively modified
and modernized. In a review of its production, Poland had
determined that 16 products still incorporated Soviet design
elements. One example was the PT-91 "Twardy" main battle
tank, which was developed from the T-72. Poland's assessment
is that the PT-91 retains approximately 3.5% of the T-72's
original design, and it is willing to pay Russia appropriate
compensation for just this 3.5%. (The Polish diplomat agreed
with the characterization of such compensation as "royalties"
rather than "licensing fees.")

17. (C) Poland and Russia are making good progress on the
issue, with talks scheduled for December or early 2010 in
Moscow. The Polish representative hoped that the two sides
would have a positive outcome with agreement on a reasonable
level of Polish payments for use of the designs. He was
uncertain why Russia continued to insist on pursuing the
issue within the WA.

18. (C) The Czech representative agreed with the Polish
characterization and noted that the Czech Republic and Russia
were holding similar discussions within the framework of
their Bilateral Commission on Economic s and Trade. He
commented that, in his personal view, the issue might not
actually have to do with the countries currently negotiating
with Russia, that Russia was seeking to use a WA agreement to
press its arms partners in Asia.
Licensing and Enforcement Officers Meeting (LEOM)


19. (U) The UK had proposed a control text in Wassenaar to
cover "used" machine tools, because they had had a case where
an exporter said a particular machine tool, when new, met the
control criteria, but was now "used" and worn down; therefore
its capability was less and it should no longer be
controlled. The EG could not agree on a control text, but
suggested that this issue could be discussed in the LEOM.
The UK would be interested in learning if other Participating
States had dealt with similar cases; if so, what actions were
taken?

Outreach


20. (U) The GWG agreed to recommend to the Plenary that a
collective post-Plenary briefing be organized for China,
Israel, Belarus, Mexico, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Chile, and

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current applicant countries. In addition, the Plenary Chair
will organize one or two bilateral Outreach meetings during
2010 with countries that have expressed an interest.
Finally, the Plenary will be authorized to initiate contacts
with Brazil, India, and Peru to see if they are interested in
the Wassenaar Arrangement.


21. (U) The U.S. received some comments from Turkey on the
U.S. proposal for a technical briefing on changes to the
control list. The U.S. agreed to post the new draft in an
effort to reach agreement by the Plenary. However, in
discussions on the margin the Russian delegation said it did
not see the benefit of this proposal, as many of these
countries were briefed bilaterally and it would be difficult
to discuss the changes in one meeting. In addition, Russia's
position is that Wassenaar should focus on other priorities,
such as the ones mentioned in Russia's opening remarks.

Participation (Membership)


22. (U) The Chair of Friends of the Chair on Membership
(FOC-M) group said the discussions resulted in agreement to
establish rapporteurs to review the applicant countries
qualifications, having noted that reviewing the laws and
regulations is not enough to know whether the country meets
the criteria. The proposal is for an initial set of
questions to be sent to the applicants and followed-up by a
meeting in Vienna led by rapporteurs and any interested WA
participating states with the applicant countries. The FOC-M
Chair stressed that the rapporteurs' function was not to
assess the qualifications of membership applicants, but
simply to collect information to provide to the wider WA
membership. The U.S, UK, and Norway have volunteered to
serve as rapporteurs. With respect to Cyprus, Turkey
continues to block Cyprus' application.

Head of Secretariat


23. (SBU) Canada (the Plenary Chair),with the support of
most Participating States, had proposed a procedure for
selecting the 2011 Head of Secretariat and extending the
current Head of Secretariat for one year. The proposal would
have recommended extending the current Head at the December
2009 Plenary and called for nominations by April 2010 for the
successor. Almost all participating states spoke in support
of the proposal. Russia rejected this recommendation,
repeating its position from the May GWG that it wanted
Participating States to put forth nominees by the December
2009 Plenary or Russia would not agree to extending the
current Head of Secretariat. Consensus was reached on
requesting the Plenary Chair continue informal consultations
with interested Participating States with a view to actively
seeking nominations for candidates for the Head of
Secretariat and to report n the results at the December
Plenary. This was requested in order to enable the Plenary
to take a decision on the formal nomination and selection
process of the next Head of Secretariat and on the possible
extension of the current Head of Secretariat for one year to
June 2011.


24. (C) Comment: Russia is getting more intransigent at
these meetings and is clearly frustrated that Participating
States are not engaging on issues Russia considers its
priorities. As a result, Russia is appears unwilling to
support any initiatives until progress is made on Russian
priorities.

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