This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

220802Z Dec 05

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BANGKOK 007802 
 
SIPDIS 
 
OES FOR ASTEWART, DGRIER 
KATHMANDU FOR REO KOCH 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: SENV PREL KCRM XC TH
SUBJECT: ASEAN WILDLIFE ENFORCEMENT NETWORK LAUNCH: AN 
EARNEST BUT HESITANT BEGINNING TO REGIONAL COOPERATION 
 
 
¶1.  (U) Summary: On December 1, representatives from nine of 
the ten ASEAN countries and the ASEAN Secretariat approved 
the launch of the ASEAN Wildlife Enforcement Network 
(ASEAN-WEN), a regional law enforcement network to combat 
illegal wildlife trafficking in Southeast Asia.  The launch 
provides a real beginning to structured information exchanges 
and cross-border cooperation between national environmental 
and law enforcement agencies where no previous structure 
existed.  A draft MOU on ASEAN-WEN remains unsigned, however, 
and key players -- national law enforcement agencies -- have 
yet to be brought into the network.  The United States, which 
has been an important behind-the-scenes supporter of the 
creation of ASEAN-WEN, will need to remain fully engaged in 
order to encourage the members of ASEAN-WEN to follow up in 
forming a fully functional law enforcement network that gets 
results.  End summary. 
 
An Earnest Beginning... 
----------------------- 
 
¶2.  (U) On December 1, Yongyut Tiyapairat, Thailand's 
Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, hosted a 
special meeting of the ASEAN Ministers responsible for the 
implementation of CITES (Convention on the International 
Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora).  The meeting 
culminated in an ASEAN statement officially launching 
ASEAN-WEN.  The statement said that "membership of the 
network is open to officials from CITES Authorities, Customs, 
Police, Prosecutors, Specialized Governmental Wildlife-Law 
Enforcement Organizations, and other relevant national law 
enforcement agencies."  The statement also noted that "the 
first meeting of ASEAN-WEN will be held in early 2006 in 
Thailand." 
 
¶3.  (U) In his welcoming address, Minister Yongyut called the 
December 1 special meeting a "historic event" and distilled 
into one phrase the central aims of ASEAN-WEN as 
"...increased involvement of law enforcement agencies and 
better cross-border government-to-government collaboration." 
U.S. Ambassador to Thailand, invited to speak because the USG 
funded the meeting, added, "Southeast Asia will no longer 
consist of ten different countries acting independently of 
each other in attempting to stop the trade in animals and 
animal parts.  Instead, each of your countries will have the 
benefit of the knowledge, training, and resources of an 
entire region, a region united to end this corrosive 
activity."  At the conclusion of the meeting, the heads of 
delegations to the December 1 special meeting issued a joint 
press statement expressing "full support for the 
establishment of ASEAN-WEN." 
 
¶4.  (U) The December 1 special meeting was the culmination of 
a series of ideas and activities that started with a speech 
by Thailand's Prime Minister Thaksin at the 13th CITES 
Conference of the Parties held in Bangkok in October 2004, in 
which he called for the creation of "a sort of wildlife 
Interpol" to combat wildlife trafficking in Southeast Asia. 
At the same CITES Conference, ASEAN issued a statement 
calling for further regional cooperation and coordination, 
and noting the importance of strengthening the law 
enforcement agencies and their integration into CITES 
implementation.  At an ASEAN meeting in May in Indonesia, 
these two ideas were married with the approval of a six-point 
ASEAN Regional Action Plan on Trade in Wild Flora and Fauna 
in which Thailand was designated to take the lead in 
achieving the second point -- improved collaboration among 
relevant law enforcement authorities in ASEAN member 
countries for wildlife law enforcement. 
 
¶5.  (U) The USG endorsed these activities and funded a 
Thailand-hosted workshop held in October at Khao Yai, 
Thailand's premier national park, that brought together 
environmental agencies from the ten ASEAN nations, along with 
representatives from the CITES Secretariat, the ASEAN 
Secretariat, the CITES Management Authority of the Republic 
 
SIPDIS 
of China, and officials from the U.S. Department of State, 
Department of Justice, and the Department of Interior's Fish 
and Wildlife Service.  The delegates, including the Chinese 
delegate, presented an overview of the wildlife trafficking 
situation in each of their countries.  The Senior Enforcement 
Officer of the CITES Secretariat presented an overview of the 
global situation with special emphasis on Southeast Asia as a 
region.  The U.S. Justice Department representative spoke 
about U.S. laws relevant to Southeast Asia and the essential 
role of informed and motivated prosecutors.  "It is not 
enough to confiscate contraband," he said, "You must capture, 
arrest, and prosecute the smugglers."  The U.S. Fish and 
Wildlife Service (FWS) representative presented details on 
best practices and on examples of how the agency has 
cooperated with foreign governments in the past, as well as 
on FWS resources available to foreign governments.  The State 
Department representative provided information on the USG's 
global Coalition against Wildlife Trafficking (CAWT). 
WildAid and TRAFFIC, two NGOs intimately involved in 
assisting governments to curb the illegal wildlife trade in 
Southeast Asia, also provided valuable presentations. 
WildAid and TRAFFIC were instrumental in the conception, 
design and launch of ASEAN-WEN.  On the final day of the 
three-day workshop, the delegates drafted an MOU for the 
creation of ASEAN-WEN and agreed to convene a ministerial 
level meeting one month later at which the MOU would be 
signed and ASEAN-WEN officially launched. 
 
...But Hesitancy behind the Scenes 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶6.  (SBU) Inexplicably, however, Thailand delayed sending out 
invitations for the ministerial until one week before the 
special meeting.  In the meantime, there was no communication 
between the relevant agencies of the ASEAN governments, with 
the result that except for the host country Thailand's 
Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, no other 
ministers showed up for the December 1 "ministerial."  In 
addition, although ASEAN-WEN is meant to be an integrated 
network among law enforcement agencies, none of the 
environment ministry representatives who attended the Khao 
Yai workshop appear to have communicated with their national 
law enforcement agencies in the interim, with the result that 
no national law enforcement agencies were represented at the 
December 1 meeting.  Although these failures in communication 
were disappointing, in fact, they only served to call 
attention to the utter absence of inter-governmental and 
intra-governmental inter-agency communication and 
coordination that ASEAN-WEN seeks to address.  (Note: In the 
days immediately preceding the December 1 meeting, the Thai 
environmental ministry requested the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok 
to inquire through other U.S. embassies in the region whom 
the ASEAN governments planned to send as delegates to the 
meeting -- again demonstrating the total lack of a mechanism 
for environmental ministries in the region to communicate 
effectively with each other.) 
 
¶7.  (SBU) The U.S. State Department's regional environmental 
hub based in Bangkok tried to convince the Thai hosts to 
invite both environmental ministries and law enforcement 
agencies from ASEAN countries to both the Khao Yai workshop 
and to the December 1 special meeting.  That would not be 
possible as it would go against protocol, the hub was told. 
When the hub tried to persuade the Thai hosts to invite China 
and India, key actors in international wildlife trade and 
important partners in any eventual expansion of ASEAN-WEN, to 
the December 1 meeting as observers, the Thai environmental 
ministry again pleaded "protocol," and invitations were never 
issued. 
 
¶8.  (SBU) Because of the short notice given to governments 
for the December 1 special meeting, Laos was unable to send 
any delegate at all.  Indonesia, Burma, and Singapore were 
represented only by their ambassadors based in Bangkok. 
During closed door sessions at the December 1 meeting, 
moreover, Malaysia, backed by Brunei Darussalam, said that 
signing the MOU would be impossible to achieve at the moment 
because it needed more time to review its provisions. 
Reportedly, Malaysia, Brunei and other country 
representatives expressed reservations about clauses in the 
draft MOU that called for the governments of ASEAN member 
countries to "allocate the financial and human resources 
necessary for the effective enforcement of legislation 
governing the conservation and sustainable use of wildlife" 
and  to "allocate the necessary financial resources to ensure 
effective implementation of this Memorandum of 
Understanding," as well as to "create a fund known as the 
Southeast Asia Wildlife Enforcement Group Fund for programs 
and projects associated with the activities of this 
Memorandum of Understanding."  The representatives opted to 
sign a Terms of Reference in lieu of a MOU.  The 
representative from Malaysia was not even authorized to join 
the press statement expressing full support for the 
establishment of ASEAN-WEN issued at the conclusion of the 
December 1 meeting. 
 
Where Do We Go from Here? 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶9.  (U) Thailand offered to host the first meeting of 
ASEAN-WEN in "early 2006."  At a press conference following 
the December 1 special meeting, Minister Yongyut confirmed 
that this will be the first of what are expected to be a 
series of regional law enforcement planning meetings and 
training courses involving environmental, police, and customs 
officers from each ASEAN member country.  He did not explain, 
however, how the "protocol" issues that kept law enforcement 
agencies away from the Khao Yai workshop and the December 1 
special meeting would be dealt with to allow them to 
participate in the forthcoming meeting. 
 
¶10.  (SBU) Comment: The delegates who attended the Khao Yai 
workshop and the December 1 special meeting worked hard and 
in earnest to create ASEAN-WEN.  Implementation of 
ASEAN-WEN's goal of developing a collaborative network of 
regional environmental and law enforcement agencies to combat 
illegal wildlife trafficking will be ineffective, however, 
unless bureaucratic and protocol obstacles can be overcome. 
The NGOs WildAid and TRAFFIC will be valuable in helping to 
surmount these obstacles, and are being supported financially 
in these efforts by a multi-year grant from USAID.  Continued 
engagement by the State Department's regional environmental 
hub and by U.S. missions in the region will be indispensable. 
ARVIZU