MINISTER OF INTERIOR REVIEWS POLICE TRAINING, CN POLICING

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 KABUL 000628 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/04/2020 TAGS: SNAR PGOV PREL PINS PK RU AF SUBJECT: MINISTER OF INTERIOR REVIEWS POLICE TRAINING, CN POLICING AND REGIONAL RELATIONS WITH DRUG CZAR Classified By: CDDEA Ambassador E. Anthony Wayne reasons 1.4 b & d. REF: 10 KABUL 575 ¶1. (C) Summary: In a February 2 meeting, Director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) R. Gil Kerlikowske joined by Ambassador Wayne, discussed a range of current issues with Afghan Minister of Interior Hanif Atmar. Atmar expressed satisfaction with the steady development of the Major Crimes Task Force (MCTF),especially on corruption, but hoped to see more progress on kidnapping, an area where the GIRoA needed better intelligence. Atmar hoped to begin sending 12-15,000 Afghan National Police (ANP) to train outside of Afghanistan each year, and to receive NATO funding and support to use a training facility constructed in Jordan for training Iraqi police for Afghan police officers. Atmar commended DEA's success in developing elite, vetted units of the Counternarcotics Police of Afghanistan (CNPA),supported expansion of the CNPA eradication force despite the termination of the U.S.-funded Poppy Eradication Force; and welcomed greater U.S. and coalition support to develop CNPA investigative capacity at the provincial level. Atmar was supportive of existing limited training exchanges with Russia, noting that other regional relationships would be more effective if pursued through a subject-specific task force structure, and requested U.S. support in pursuing such an approach with Pakistan (which Kerlikowske agreed to convey to FBI Director Mueller). He also commented on recent raids against hawalas (reftel). End Summary. MAJOR CRIMES TASK FORCE -------------- ¶2. (C) Minister Atmar expressed satisfaction with progress on the Major Crimes Task Force (MCTF),observing that it was slowly emerging as a key law enforcement institution in Afghanistan and that he was working with the FBI as well as the UK Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) to accelerate progress. While good progress had been made on the MCTF Corruption and Kidnapping Units, not as much progress had been made on specific kidnapping cases, which require better intelligence assets than the Afghan government currently possesses. POLICE: LOOKING FOR TRAINING ABROAD, INCLUDING IN JORDAN -------------- -------------- --- ¶3. (C) Turning to the Afghan National Police (ANP),Atmar sought help from international partners to train a new generation of police leaders (and noted he planned to raise this issue with FBI Director Mueller during his upcoming visit in late February). Since the maximum annual training capacity in Afghanistan was about 30,000 trainees, and there was a need to train 50,000 per year to meet expansion targets and offset attrition, Atmar expressed that hope that U.S. and European officials could train 12-15,000 officers per year outside of Afghanistan. As the U.S. had constructed a big facility for police training in Jordan, which he had heard was under-utilized, he thought it would make a good site for ANP training and especially for officer candidate training. The opportunity to study abroad would boost the appeal for ANP recruits, while training in safer Jordan would make it easier for the Europeans to provide trainers. EUPOL, he noted, had missed its trainer targets for the past two years due to the reluctance of European police trainers to come to Afghanistan. ¶4. (C) Noting that he had sought Ambassador Holbrooke's help in lining up the Jordan facility, Atmar expressed hope that the ANP would hope to obtain rights to use the facility free of charge, with international donors providing meals and incidental expenses to the Afghan trainees with NATO transporting the trainees. The Minister said he planned to raise this proposal at the NATO Summit in Istanbul. He said he also hoped the UAE might contribute to paying expenses. DEVELOPING THE COUNTERNARCOTICS POLICE -------------- ¶5. (C) Minister Atmar expressed his commitment to strengthening the Counter-narcotics Police of Afghanistan (CNPA),especially in the area of intelligence, adding that he had recently authorized its expansion. He said the CNPA Counter-narcotics Training Academy was one of our best training facilities. Atmar characterized the CNPA as having three tiers: the top end, where vetted units developed by DEA (our most trustworthy partner) and SOCA were doing a great job; the eradication force, which Atmar said planned to expand despite the termination of the U.S. Poppy Eradication Force (PEF) program (We need to keep that force to demonstrate that we are serious); and the CNPA officers on the ground, responsible for investigating narcotics cases, which faced the greatest challenges, especially in the area of intelligence. Ambassador Wayne noted that DEA and INL were working with DoD's Combined Security Transition Command - Afghanistan (CSTC-A)on how to build capacity within the CNPA, including: using some of the personnel from the former PEF, working with the vetted National Interdiction Unit (NIU),and providing more training. Atmar welcomed this, commenting that his goal was to obtain enough resources to establish a functioning CNPA presence in all of KABUL 00000628 002 OF 002 Afghanistan's 365 districts. To that end, he had already allocated several hundred more tashkiel (approved personnel register) slots to the CNPA, adding that 95 percent of CNPA positions were filled. Noting that the drug mafia needs to know the police are after them, he observed that while production was concentrated in the South, trafficking continued to be a problem even in the North that had largely beat back poppy cultivation. REGIONAL RELATIONS - MOVING TO A TASK FORCE BASED APPROACH -------------- -------------- ¶6. (C) Noting that his next stop would be Moscow, Director Kerlikowske asked if there were any areas of cooperation he might suggest to the Russians. Atmar responded that Russia had offered to provide training, and while there was initially some Afghan resistance, he was prepared to expand that, although I don't want to send everyone to Moscow. He said it is essential to maintain a relationship with Russian law enforcement to foster regional cooperation on narcotics and weapons trafficking, particularly with the Central Asian republics. Regional cooperation has been unsuccessful over the last eight years because of the inadequacy of institutional arrangements, not because of the lack of political will. He expressed the desire to form working level joint task forces with Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, to look at issues like trade/smuggling, weapons and narcotics. ¶7. (C) Minister Atmar also commented on the difficulty of working with the Iranians and Pakistanis. Iran's support for insurgents has made cooperation difficult, and Atmar had encountered resistance from the Afghan Border Police to working with their Iranian counterparts because they resent Iran's support for insurgents. With Pakistan, Atmar had had limited success in establishing a joint task force, as agreed with FBI Director Mueller and GOP Minister Malik. The key to progress on these issues would be to move them from normal diplomatic channels to police-centered task forces, away from the bureaucracy, he argued. Atmar said he would appreciate U.S. assistance in establishing such an approach; Kerlikowske pledged to discuss this with Director Mueller in Washington. ¶8. (C) Director Kerlikowske asked whether Interpol had a role to play in addressing these issues. Atmar responded that it should, for example, on drugs, money-laundering, threat finance, and counter-terrorism. DEA had told him that people were smuggling thirty million dollars a week through Kabul Airport, so Interpol had a key role in determining where that money was going (with Afghan law enforcement entities responsible for identifying where it came from). Another useful role for Interpol would be to arrange the deportation of criminals with outstanding arrest warrants who were working against Afghanistan in Quetta and Karachi, he stated. ¶9. (C) Atmar and Wayne also discussed recent threat finance enforcement actions, and next steps (septel). ¶10. (SBU) This message has been cleared by ONDCP Director Kerlikowske. EIKENBERRY