VZCZCXRO7073
OO RUEHCHI RUEHDT RUEHHM RUEHNH
DE RUEHPF #1700/01 2620927
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
O 190927Z SEP 06
FM AMEMBASSY PHNOM PENH
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 7338
INFO RUCNASE/ASEAN MEMBER COLLECTIVE
RUEHHM/AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH 0056
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 1528

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 PHNOM PENH 001700 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR PRM AND EAP/MLS 
BANGKOK ALSO FOR REFUGEE COORDINATOR HONNOLD 
GENEVA FOR RMA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREF PREL CB VM
SUBJECT: CAMBODIA: MONTAGNARD UPDATE, RESPONSE TO NGO 
ALLEGATIONS 
 
REF: PHNOM PENH 1608 
 
PHNOM PENH 00001700  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Summary.  The Cambodian government (RGC) granted 
permission for a joint UNHCR expedition to Mondolkiri 
province to rescue Montagnards following approaches from the 
Ambassador and A/DCM.  Separately, 14 Montagnards arrived 
directly at UNHCR's Phnom Penh office from Mondolkiri on 
September 15.  Claiming to have evidence of payments from 
Montagnard activists in the U.S., police arrested a 
Vietnamese man (ethnic Khmer Krom) for smuggling Montagnards 
from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh by automobile. 
Assertions by Montagnard lobbyists that poor interpretation 
or Vietnamese agents have conspired to prevent Montagnards 
from gaining refugee status do not appear credible.  From 
January to July of this year, Montagnard arrivals are up 
nearly 50% from the same period last year, totaling 170 
(minus 30 who later proved to be Cambodians) this year. 
Direct arrivals are up over 50%.   End Summary. 
 
Seeking Montagnards in Mondolkiri 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (SBU) In response to UNHCR's request for USG help in 
gaining access to Mondolkiri and during a September 13 
courtesy meeting between MFA officials and visiting A/S Maura 
Harty, the Ambassador urged the Cambodian government (RGC) to 
permit UNHCR to travel to Mondolkiri province to investigate 
reports of recent Montagnard arrivals (reftel).  MFA 
Secretary of State Long Visalo responded to the Ambassador 
 
SIPDIS 
that the RGC understood its obligations under the 1951 
Refugee Convention and cooperated with UNHCR on joint 
missions to pick up Montagnards in the provinces.  The RGC, 
he said, continued to respect the tripartite MOU as a 
guideline.  The A/DCM followed up the same day with MOI 
Secretary of State Prum Sokha, who echoed Long Visalo's 
 
SIPDIS 
remarks concerning official RGC policy towards the 
Montagnards.  Sokha, however, noted that implementation 
through the ranks of all MOI police officials was uneven.  He 
acknowledged that  the MOI was sometimes slow in responding 
to UNHCR requests.  He underscored that the Montagnard is a 
difficult issue for the Cambodian government, noting 
Vietnamese concerns over the separatist agenda of some 
Montagnards.  Sokha added that given the ethnic similarities 
between the Montagnards and Cambodian minority groups in 
northeastern Cambodia, the RGC is concerned about the spread 
of separatist tendencies across the border.  The RGC approved 
UNHCR travel to Mondolkiri immediately after these 
approaches, but has not yet arranged a date for the travel. 
UNHCR announced September 15 that 14 Montagnards who had been 
hiding in Mondolkiri arrived directly at its Phnom Penh 
office on that date.  There are currently 272 Montagnards in 
UNHCR's Phnom Penh sites. 
 
Police Arrest Montagnard Smuggler 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  (U) On September 5. Phnom Penh police arrested a 
Vietnamese man, Lam Nguyen, an ethnic Khmer Krom, whom they 
accused of driving three Montagnards from Ho Chi Minh City in 
an automobile.  He reportedly admitted to bringing at least 
seven Montagnards to UNHCR in Phnom Penh and receiving 
thousands of dollars for the service.  Police told the press 
they had confiscated Western Union money transfer receipts 
showing the transfer of funds from Montagnard activists in 
the U.S. to pay the suspect to smuggle asylum seekers.  UNHCR 
said Lam Nguyen applied for asylum as a Montagnard on 
Septembers; however, UNHCR determined that he was not a 
Montagnard and rejected him. 
 
Comments on NGO Claims 
---------------------- 
 
¶4.  (SBU) In a September 11 meeting with PRM A/S Sauerbrey, 
Kay Reibold of the Montagnard Development Project and members 
of the Montagnard human rights organizations made a number of 
assertions regarding UNHCR and the processing of Montagnards. 
 UNHCR has heard all these allegations in the past from 
Montagnard advocacy groups.  The following are post's 
comments on those assertions relating to UNHCR processing in 
Cambodia. 
 
--  Claim:  Montagnards are not fleeing for economic reasons; 
they are fleeing intense persecution.  Comment:  While this 
is probably best answered by posts in Vietnam, UNHCR has 
noted that their staff are trained to formulate their lines 
 
PHNOM PENH 00001700  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
of questioning to look for a claim; doubts are resolved in 
the favor of the applicant.  In addition, staff are sensitive 
to the relatively low levels of education among most 
applicants and interpreters word their questions simply, and 
in multiple ways.  For instance, in assessing police 
harassment or possible detention, UNHCR will ask a series of 
questions regarding the police, including asking if the 
police have visited their residences, requested the applicant 
to come by the police station, has the applicant ever seen 
the inside of police station, etc. -- and not simply ask one 
question regarding whether or not they have been arrested. 
There are multiple opportunities to assess claims of 
persecution. 
 
--  Claim:  UNHCR does not have qualified interpreters to 
interview Montagnards resulting in the denial of refugee 
status to bona fide refugees.  Comment:  Interpretation is 
often cumbersome at UNHCR; sometimes interviewers must go 
from English to Vietnamese to an ethnic minority language and 
back again.  Nevertheless, UNHCR has been doing this work 
long enough (at least five years) that the process is by now 
routine and problems are not insurmountable.  There are 
sufficient interviews and reviews of applications that the 
likelihood of anyone being rejected due to language 
interpretation difficulties is exceedingly small.  In 
addition, UNHCR provides at each site comment boxes (that are 
opened by an international staff member, not the local staff) 
to review any complaints or pass a message to the 
international staff.  UNHCR staff add that they routinely 
conduct a second look at all rejected applicants, even for 
those who have not requested an appeal to ensure they are not 
overlooking legitimate claimants. 
 
--  Claim:  At least one of the UNHCR staff in Cambodia is 
ethnic Vietnamese and an agent of the GVN whose job is to 
send people back.  Comment:  None of the expatriate staff who 
have power to make decisions on refugee status determination 
is Vietnamese.  UNHCR has no reason to keep such a person on 
its staff and would immediately dismiss any such person if 
UNHCR were aware of him/her.  The Montagnard lobbyists have 
made this charge in the past, according to UNHCR, which had 
asked for specific information so that UNHCR could 
investigate; no one provided anything.  UNHCR has conducted 
objective investigations of staff malfeasance in the past. 
 
--  Claim:  The GVN has planted persons among the asylum 
seekers to coach them with wrong answers so that UNHCR will 
deny them refugee status.  Comment:  According to UNHCR 
staff, the evidence is to the contrary; i.e., Montagnard 
lobbyists have attempted to coach the Montagnards so that 
they will be able to obtain refugee status.  UNHCR noted that 
sometimes during an appeal process, a claimant's story would 
completely change and be more consistent with an asylum claim 
-- thereby leading to the suspicion that person had been 
coached to change his/her story.  There is sufficient 
communication among the Montagnard asylum seekers that a 
person coaching wrong answers would be quickly identified by 
the group.  That said, it is plausible that the GVN has 
planted agents among the asylum seekers so that they will be 
able to monitor the activities of Montagnard activists in the 
U.S. 
 
Profile of Montagnard Arrivals 
------------------------------ 
 
¶5.  (U) UNHCR has drafted an analysis of Montagnard arrivals 
between January and July of this year.  There were 170 
arrivals in Cambodia during this period compared to 99 during 
the same period last year, although 30 of the arrivals in 
2006 were later identified as Khmer nationals.  Of the 140 
Montagnards, 98 came from Gia Lai, 20 from Dak Lak, 16 from 
the new province of Dak Nong and one from Lam Dong.  Five 
children were born in Phnom Penh.  Almost all of the 2006 
arrivals sought asylum based on claims of persecution rather 
than family reunion. 
 
¶6.  (U) There were 49 direct arrivals in Phnom Penh compared 
to 31 in 2005.  UNHCR attributed the increase partly to 
sometimes lengthy delays in sending joint missions to the 
provinces due to slow response time from the RGC.  UNHCR 
suggested that a contributing factor might be the improved 
communication between Montagnards in Vietnam and those in the 
U.S.  The NGOs Human Rights Watch (HRW) and Jesuit Refugee 
Service (JRS) have also been increasingly involved in 
escorting direct arrivals to UNHCR.  HRW and JRS facilitated 
 
PHNOM PENH 00001700  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
seven of the nine groups of direct arrivals during this 
period. 
 
¶7.  (SBU)  UNHCR conducted refugee status determination (RSD) 
on 55% of the 140 arrivals by the end of July.  Of these, 17% 
qualified as refugees, while 38% were rejected, though some 
of these had appeals pending.  UNHCR found significant 
differences among ethnic groups in qualifying as refugees. 
Among the Jarai, the largest group of asylum seekers, only 14 
of 101 obtained refugee status.  Smaller ethnic groups tended 
to have stronger claims.  UNHCR believed that at least half 
of the 20 Ede arriving in 2006 would qualify.  Four of the 16 
Mnong arrivals have qualified and most of the others appear 
to have strong cases. All of the arrivals in recent years 
from the smallest ethnic groups (Bahnar, Lach and Koho) have 
been screened in.  Not surprisingly, UNHCR found that those 
who qualified had significantly higher levels of political 
and religious activity than those screened out.  Almost all 
experienced arrest and detention by Vietnamese authorities. 
Some were screened in because of repeated contacts with 
Montagnards in the U.S. to report on the situation in the 
central highlands. 
 
Option 2 and UNHCR/Phnom Penh's Budget 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶8.  (U)  UNHCR reports that their Phnom Penh office budget 
will undergo a 40 percent reduction in the coming year, and 
the office will be forced to reduce its international and 
local staffing as a result.  The budget cut was part of the 
reason UNHCR proposed that the USG do the initial Montagnard 
RSD screening rather than UNHCR.  Even if the budget were not 
a factor, UNHCR finds it difficult to justify housing and 
feeding screened out Montagnards who are not recognized 
refugees and who should be returned to Vietnam under the 
Tripartite MOU. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶9.  (SBU)  UNHCR was not surprised by the allegations; they 
had heard them all before and had well-reasoned responses. 
Moreover, they stressed that UNHCR is very flexible with 
Montagnard applications, understanding well the USG policy 
undercurrents.  They opined that they note a strain of 
desperation in recent criticism of UNHCR by those in the 
Montagnard advocacy community.  UNHCR attributes this to an 
inability on the part of those who have made a career out of 
condemning the GVN to come to grips with greater GVN 
cooperation on monitoring visits and access to the Central 
Highlands by UNHCR and diplomatic missions. 
 
¶10.  (SBU)  Comment continued.  We remain opposed to the USG 
assuming the primary RSD role from UNHCR in processing 
Montagnards.  Despite assertions that there will be no pull 
factor, we believe it's already occurring, with this year's 
arrivals already exceeding those in 2004 -- the last year of 
significant unrest in the Central Highlands.  We sympathize 
with UNHCR staff, who feel trapped between a USG policy 
favoring Montagnards, and special interest groups in the U.S. 
with an agenda directed towards internal Vietnamese politics. 
 Nevertheless, we do not support changing USG policy in a way 
that could be detrimental to our bilateral relationship with 
the Cambodian government.  We believe that increased 
Montagnard arrivals will prove an irritant with the RGC, 
although post will continue to impress upon Cambodian 
officials the need to adhere to their stated policy vis-a-vis 
Montagnards.  The RGC is well aware that the numbers of 
legitimate refugees have declined significantly since 2004, 
fraudulent applications are up, as are NGO-assisted direct 
arrivals.  End Comment. 
MUSSOMELI