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PP RUEHAG RUEHBC RUEHDE RUEHDF RUEHIK RUEHKUK RUEHLZ RUEHROV
DE RUEHLB #0483/01 0991012
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 081012Z APR 08
FM AMEMBASSY BEIRUT
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 1468
INFO RUEHEE/ARAB LEAGUE COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUCNMEM/EU MEMBER STATES COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RHMFISS/CDR USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL PRIORITY
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEHNO/USMISSION USNATO PRIORITY 2381
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK PRIORITY 2113

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 BEIRUT 000483 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPT FOR INL/AAE, NEA/ELA, NSC FOR ABRAMS/SINGH/HARDING 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PINS PREL PBTS NAS PGOV IS SY LE
SUBJECT: VISIT OF INL ASSISTANT SECRETARY TO LEBANON MARCH 30-31, 
2008 
 
REF: BEIRUT 451 
 
¶1. (U) Summary: During his official visit to Lebanon March 30 to 
March 31, 2008, Assistant Secretary of State for International 
Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), David T. Johnson 
reaffirmed the U.S. government commitment to a sovereign, democratic 
Lebanon, and discussed INL's continuing support to enhance the 
capabilities of the Lebanese security forces.  Discussions with 
Lebanese government officials, Internal Security Force's Command 
Staff and visits to the three principal training facilities of the 
ISF highlighted the continuing need for USG funded training, 
equipment and infrastructure upgrades to strengthen the ISF so that 
it can develop into a modern, professional police force capable of 
combating the terrorist and other criminal threats Lebanon faces. 
End summary. 
 
¶2. (U)Accompanied by Charge d'Affaires (CDA) Michele Sison, INL 
Beirut Director, Virginia Sher Ramadan, INL officers Adam Bloomquist 
and Cassandra Stuart and White House Fellow Kathryn Spletstoser, A/S 
Johnson discussed capacity building and security issues with 
Lebanese government officials, including Prime Minister Fouad 
Siniora, Minister of Interior and Municipal Affairs Hassan Sabaa, 
Director General of the Internal Security Forces (ISF), Achraf Rifi, 
and members of his command staff, and General Siham Harakeh of the 
Directorate General of General Security (DGS). 
 
SINIORA:  ASSISTANCE NECESSARY, 
BUT SO ARE SOLUTIONS TO MIDDLE EAST ISSUES 
------------------------------------------ 
 
¶3. (SBU) Prime Minister Siniora expressed his appreciation for the 
security assistance and training that INL has promised and 
delivered.  With the Director General of the ISF seated beside him, 
the PM noted that a strong ISF is essential for Lebanese security, 
and that the lack of security has contributed to the difficult times 
Lebanon is facing.  Siniora remarked that although all of the USG 
assistance programs are important to enhance Lebanon's security, the 
real problem is the Israeli occupation, and the lack of readiness to 
resolve it.  (See Reftel for further reporting on PM Siniora's 
comments on the Lebanese political situation). 
 
MINISTER OF INTERIOR STRESSES 
NEED TO STRENGTHEN BORDER SECURITY 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶4. (SBU)In his first meeting with Interior Minister Sabaa, whose 
Ministry has nominal authority over both the ISF and the DGS, 
Johnson made clear that INL assistance is part of the broader USG 
commitment to Lebanon.  He explained INL's increasing assistance to 
help stabilize post-conflict societies and its programs to 
strengthen democracies through criminal justice related 
institutional development. Sabaa thanked the USG for its support, 
and for recognizing the essential role the ISF plays. 
 
Sabaa urged that border secuity assistance should be a top 
priority. Not only would border controls hinder the currently 
unimpeded smuggling of arms and terrorists into Lebanon across the 
porous Eastern border with Syria, it would also help to control the 
smuggling of drugs, cultivated in and exported from the Beqaa areas 
controlled by Hizbollah. 
 
He explained that although the Northern Border Pilot Program aims to 
create a common border force including all four security agencies, 
in reality border security is currently under the control of one of 
the agencies of the Lebanese Armed Forces.  Sabaa hopes that the ISF 
will one day have sufficient capacity to assume a larger protective 
role along the border and around the Palestinian camps, and assume 
its traditional policing responsibilities, now provided by the LAF. 
 
 
ISF: CONTINUED ASSISTANCE NECESSARY 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶5. (SBU) General Rifi, the well respected Commander of the ISF, 
Explain that the ISF suffered through 30 years of Syrian control, 
and that it lacks technical expertise because of the Syrian 
occupation, Rifi thanked the USG for its ongoing assistance and 
expressed his appreciation for the team efforts of the USG in 
working with the ISF to combat terrorism.  Rifi highlighted that the 
ISF has expanded from 12,000 police to 23,500 since the withdrawal 
of the Syrians in 2005, but has not received any commensurate 
increase in its operating budget to handle the augmented costs 
 
BEIRUT 00000483  002 OF 003 
 
 
associated with the greater number of personnel. 
 
Noting that initially ISF coordinated on its own all assistance 
offered by international donors, Rifi admitted that with the 
increase in the number of donors and the amount and type of the 
foreign assistance offered in the last year, there is a need for 
greater coordination to avoid duplication and redundancy.  He sought 
USG assistance to help generate ideas to strengthen its operations 
and training and to coordinate the international donations. 
 
¶6. (U) Rifi stated that the ISF is intent on providing more human 
rights training for its staff and recruits, and wants to bring in 
women to the ISF, with an ultimate goal of hiring 3,000 to 4,000 
female police. INL's refurbishing plans for the Police Academy are 
being drawn to accommodate the first group of women cadets with 
separate dormitories and facilities.  Currently the ISF has only a 
handful of women, all computer specialists. (Note: the DGS has more 
female officers and inspectors; among its top command staff at least 
two are women officers, both of whom met with the A/S during this 
trip.) 
 
DGS: BORDER SECURITY AND NEED FOR BIOMETRICS 
AND TRAINING 
-------------------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (U) At the headquarters of the Directorate General for General 
Security (DGS)  A/S Johnson met with the general in charge of border 
security, General Siham Harakeh, (filling in for General Wafiq 
Jezzine who fell ill the day before), and the head of the 
intelligence branch,  Colonel Jumana Daniel.  DGS is the security 
agency responsible for immigration and border inspection matters, 
including passports, visas, foreign residency papers, travel 
documents for refugees and naturalization.  Although INL's ongoing 
assistance program in Lebanon has concentrated on the ISF, this week 
INL provided data mining software, 20 computers and training in the 
use of the software to the DGS, which is one of the four agencies of 
the nascent Common Border Force. 
 
Harakeh reported that DGS has approximately 1,000 immigration 
inspectors, 350 of whom are assigned to the Beirut International 
Airport and 700 at the four land border crossings (soon to be 
expanded to five).  DGS inspectors have received little 
international training, apart from a short course in document fraud 
provided by the Germans.  In order to properly protect Lebanese 
borders from unlawful entrants, Harakeh requested USG assistance for 
digital fingerprint or eye scan equipment and the necessary training 
in its use.  Currently immigration and nationality checks are made 
only against name and birth date and place data, with no method to 
uncover identity fraud through biometric verifications.  Harakeh and 
DGS also have responsibility over the detention of undocumented and 
trafficked foreigners in Lebanon, and DGS have worked to help 
establish protocols to combat trafficking in persons and provide 
refuge through the establishment of a safe house for trafficked 
women.  A/S Johnson expressed USG support for continued cooperation 
in immigration and border security programs to strengthen Lebanese 
control over its border. 
 
INL ASSISTANCE TO ISF 
--------------------- 
 
¶8. (U) The meetings with the Director General of the ISF, Rifi, and 
his command staff, over the two day visit concentrated on discussing 
the progress of the ongoing training program and the provision of 
equipment and proposed infrastructure improvements.  The multi-year 
U.S. Government assistance program to the ISF is focused on 
training, equipment donations and infrastructure development.  Ten 
American police advisors, with three U.S. police specialists are 
currently working with ISF trainers and officers to train 8,000 
police recruits and 1,200 instructors over a four year period in 
modern police practices, administration, democratic policing, human 
rights, criminal investigations and other essential law enforcement 
skills.  U.S.-sponsored training also assists Lebanese police 
advisers in drafting curriculum and training police recruits.   As 
the training program develops further, additional classrooms will be 
provided, police dormitories refurbished, and dining and kitchen 
facilities upgraded. 
 
¶9. (U) The U.S. Government has been assisting the ISF in its 
development since October 2006 through several different programs. 
These programs have provided 3000 sets of civil disorder management 
equipment to the ISF Mobile Forces, 60 new sports utility vehicles 
and duty gear to 4000 cadets in various ISF units, and new academy 
 
BEIRUT 00000483  003 OF 003 
 
 
classrooms, offices, firing range and equipment with which to 
provide training.  Over the next three months, 300 new police cars 
will be delivered, and the program will finance the refurbishment of 
11 police operation centers and substations with technologically 
advanced communications equipment, computers and GPS/GIS type 
software with the ultimate goal of providing communications 
connectivity to the entirety of the ISF. 
 
VISITS TO THE TRAINING CENTERS 
------------------------------ 
 
¶10. (U) ISF training is divided among three centers: the main 
Academy at Warwar in Beirut (where basic training for recruits takes 
place), the Mobile Forces headquarters in Dbaye, a suburb of Beirut 
(where training of the SWAT team and the Black Panthers occurs) and 
in Aramoun near the Beirut airport, (where the ISF Information 
Bureau trains its special forces). The ISF would like to consolidate 
training at Aramoun, and has been seeking funding from international 
donors to build a new $30 to $50 million academy/ training facility 
on the 220,000 square meters Aramoun site.  ISF is currently 
drafting plans for a new facility.  A/S Johnson and CDA Sison 
affirmed the USG's commitment to work with other donors who could 
provide funding for the proposed training facility in Aramoun, and 
stated that the USG would be prepared to rechannel funding to equip 
portions of the new facility in cooperation with other donors. 
 
¶11. (U) A/S Johnson visited all three training centers.  At Warwar, 
he addressed the assembled press and the first class of 181 cadets 
of the INL Police Training Program, after taking a tour of the 
facilities and the INL funded classrooms.  At Aramoun, the 
Information Bureau's Special Forces presented demonstrations on VIP 
protection and urban intervention and rescue techniques, as well as 
rappelling and firing range exhibits and obstacle course training. 
In Dbaye, the mobile forces presented a simulated labor 
demonstration/riot, and showed how they can control it with an array 
of internationally donated advanced equipment, including armored 
vehicles, truck mounted water cannons to disperse crowds, and riot 
and crowd control gear provided by INL. General Robert Jabbour, head 
of the Mobile Forces, showed the delegation the 15 new Dodge Charger 
Police Cars that had just arrived from the U.S. as part of INL's 
Lebanon equipment donation program. 
 
¶12. (U) Press coverage of the entire visit was extensive and 
positive.  Print and broadcast media representing all political 
factions covered the visit and noted the aim of the INL program to 
support the democratic government of Lebanon and help it 
professionalize its security institutions. 
 
¶13. (U) This message has been cleared by Assistant Secretary 
Johnson. 
 
SISON