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C O N F I D E N T I A L TASHKENT 000763 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR SCA/CEN 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/01/2018 
TAGS: AORC PREL ASEC KTIA PINR PINS PTER UZ
SUBJECT: UZBEKISTAN/SCO: OFFICIAL DESCRIBES SCO'S 
COUNTERTERRORIST ACTIVITIES IN CENTRAL ASIA 
 
REF: A. TASHKENT 546 
     ¶B. TASHKENT 714 
 
Classified By: Poloff Steven Prohaska for reasons 1.4 (b, d). 
 
¶1. (C) Bakhram Auanassov, a Senior Expert from the Shanghai 
Cooperation Organization's (SCO) Regional Antiterrorist 
Structure (RATS), recently provided Poloff with a speech on 
the SCO's role in Central Asian security.  He had intended to 
give the speech during the Tashkent-hosted international 
conference on Afghanistan in late April (reftel A), but may 
have avoided this due to time constraints.  His comments 
reflect concerns about blocking terrorist financing, outline 
RATS priorities, and highlight RATS efforts to reach out to 
other international organizations.  Auanassov claims that 
RATS activities have prevented a series of terrorist acts, 
thus facilitating economic and cultural cooperation between 
SCO members.  His speech also includes some remarks on the 
worsening narcotics situation in Afghanistan after the 
Coalition's arrival.  This, in conjunction with questions 
Auanassov has posed to Poloff on results of Coalition/ISAF 
efforts in Afghanistan (reftel B), suggests that the SCO is 
considering critiquing Coalition efforts there during its 
July conference on Afghanistan and the August SCO summit, 
both to be held in Dushanbe.  He also asserts that the SCO is 
pursuing "real joint action" with Afghan authorities. 
 
¶2. (SBU) Post's unofficial translation of Auanassov's speech 
follows: 
 
      Let me express on behalf of the leadership of the 
Executive Committee of the Regional Antiterrorist Structure 
of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization gratitude to the 
sponsors of the conference for their invitation. 
 
      The world community is intensifying its efforts to 
counteract international terrorism, separatism, and 
extremism.  Besides the special services of countries, the 
United Nations, the Organization for Security and Cooperation 
in Europe, the SCO, and other regional organizations have 
engaged in this work.  At the same time, terrorist activity 
is continuing to take place in practically all countries of 
the world, including on the territory of the SCO 
member-states. 
 
      This concerns the Central Asian region as well, where 
the members of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and 
Hizb-ut-Tahrir are trying to destabilize the situation. 
Nevertheless, well-coordinated work of the special services 
of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan permitted a series 
of successful operations terminating cells that belong to 
these organizations. 
 
      In Kazakhstan, several members of the international 
terrorist organization "Islamic Party of Turkestan"--who 
under orders from their leaders abroad were enaged in 
recruiting activities among Kazakh citizens and the 
preparation of terrorist acts--have been detained.  In 
contact with the National Security Service of Uzbekistan, a 
cell of the international terrorist organization "Jamiyat of 
Mujahideen of Central Asia" that was operating on the 
territory of some Central Asian states was destroyed. 
 
      Analysis of the activity of the terrorist groups 
provides a basis for the conclusion that they, adjusting to 
 
new realities, are modifying the tactics and methods of their 
activity and their sources of funding.  Definition of 
political goals is becoming a characteristic feature of the 
activity of terrorists.  Slogans about the creation of a 
"worldwide caliphate" are more and more often being 
reinforced by specific demands to ensure the "rights and 
freedoms" of the Muslim population and to release individuals 
connected with terrorist activities from jails. 
 
      Cells of international terrorist organizations 
operating on the territories of SCO member-states differ in 
their level of autonomy.  They do not always follow the 
instructions of their bosses, but undertake certain actions 
depending on the developing situation in the country.  The 
special services of many countries are implementing a series 
of measures on blocking sources of funding for terrorist 
organizations, so they have moved toward schemes outside of 
banks to attract and use money.  Private donations and assets 
of criminal groups that are under the control of terrorists 
are often accumulated and transported by couriers as cash 
money, precious stones and metals. 
 
      On the whole, the capabilities of many terrorist groups 
for self-financing have been preserved.  In the meantime, 
profits from the narcotics business and other types of 
criminal activity are becoming a more substantial source of 
funding for terrorist groups.  The rapidly expanding 
narcotics business that provides a substantial financial 
injection for terrorist, separatist, and extremist 
organizations is an important factor related to threats and 
challenges for SCO member-states.  The harvesting of 
narcotics plants and the production and distribution of 
narcotics materials in Afghanistan is not only not 
decreasing, but after the arrival of the antiterrorist 
Coalition forces, unfortunately, has increased by four times, 
having reached 97 percent of world production. 
 
      Considering that reliable blockage of the sources of 
funding, including that received from illegal drug 
trafficking, would be a serious blow to terrorist groups, the 
SCO in the framework of the "SCO-Afghanistan" Contact Group 
is taking steps on ensuring real joint action with Afghan 
authorities.  First of all, this includes curtailing the 
production process of narcotics materials, supression of 
their transit through SCO-member states, and also the 
destruction of bases and training centers for militants 
functioning on the territory of the country. 
 
      Thus, all necessary work on forming a normative and 
organizational basis for successful activity of this Contact 
Group has been done.  The Plan on implementation of 
suggestions made at the Seventh Meeting of the Council of 
Heads of State of the SCO (August 16, 2007 in Bishkek) and 
also the Plan of organizational measures on expanding 
multilateral cooperation of the SCO with Afghanistan were 
prepared. 
 
      Effectively combating terrorism, separatism, and 
extremism is possible only under close mutual action between 
the special services and the law enforcement structures of 
the SCO member states.  The aforementioned positive results 
achieved in fighting terrorism in 2007 serve as confirmation 
of this.  In addition, coordination and mutual action of the 
appropriate authorities with the assistance of the Executive 
Committee of the SCO RATS have been implemented in the 
 
following directions: 
 
¶A. Realization of joint operational measures.  For example, 
the localization of negative processes in the Ferghana Valley 
capable of influencing the situation in the SCO was a result 
of this. 
 
¶B. The exchange of preventive operational information that 
facilitates the prevention of terrorist acts.  Thanks to such 
cooperation in 2006-2007, we managed to prevent a 
considerable number of terrorist acts on the territories of 
the SCO member-states.  Together with this, the received 
information is actively used in the process of providing 
security during large-scale public-political events in the 
countries of the SCO. 
 
¶C. Search and extradition by interested states of the leaders 
and members of terrorist organizations.  Over this period of 
time, a significant number of members of terrorist 
organizations connected with many crimes have been found and 
extradited.  For example, several persons wanted for 
terrorist activities have been extradited to Russia, 
Uzbekistan, and other SCO member-states by the appropriate 
authorities in Kazakhstan.  The extradition of these persons 
to Russia allowed Russia's Federal Security Service to find 
new hidden warehouses of weapons and solve several crimes in 
the North Caucasus.  Kazakhstan's National Security Committee 
extradited to Russia members of illegal armed formations who 
intended to conduct terrorist acts in the Russian Federation 
with the involvement of Kazakh citizens.  Kazakhstan 
extradited three persons to Uzbekistan who were accused by 
Uzbek law enforcement bodies of committing very serious 
crimes, including terrorism, intentional murder, and 
sabotage.  There are also several other examples of active 
work of the appropriate authorities in this direction. 
 
¶D. Holding joint antiterrorist exercises. For improvement of 
the practical skills of joint action of the appropriate 
authorities of the SCO member-states, the exercises 
"East-Antiterror 2006", "Tian Shan No. 1 2006", and "Issyk 
Kul Antiterror 2007" were conducted on the territory of 
Kyrgyzstan with the assistance of the SCO RATS.  The purpose 
of their activity was to perfect joint action between the 
force structures of the member-states in the exercises during 
implementation of special operations neutralizing terrorist 
groups and increasing the preparedness of antiterrorist units 
for practical action.  Besides this, they refined joint 
measures on protection of the state border during the 
implementation of the antiterrorist operation and perfected 
the system of mutual notification between appropriate 
authorities.  The leadership and personnel of the force 
structures that were participating in implementation received 
practical experience in planning and preparation of special 
measures. 
 
      With the goal of increasing the effectiveness of the 
special services and law enforcement bodies, first and 
foremost their joint action in the framework of the SCO, the 
RATS jointly with the representatives of the appropriate 
authorities of the SCO member-states have worked out several 
normative legal and other documents. 
 
      Besides this, efforts have been concentrated on forming 
a Single List of terrorist, separatist, and extremist 
organizations, the activity of which has been forbidden in 
 
all SCO member states. 
 
      For the creation of such a list, the principle question 
from the legal point of view is: what are the consequences of 
recognition by one of the SCO countries of a terrorist (or 
separatist or extremist) organization for other SCO 
member-states? 
 
      The Council of the SCO RATS has worked out and approved 
the Statutes on a Single List of Wanted Persons identified by 
the special services of the SCO countries for committing--or 
being suspected of committing--terrorist, separatist, and 
extremist crimes.  The Single List of the Wanted Persons 
started to function in 2006. 
 
      The creation and introduction of the protected database 
is increasing the effectiveness of cooperation in the 
framework of the SCO RATS and giving it a more clear and 
purposeful character. 
 
      For implementation of the statutes of the Agreement on 
Long-Term Good Neighborly Relations, Friendship and 
Cooperation that the SCO member-states signed in August 2007 
at the Summit of SCO Heads of State in Bishkek, in particular 
on active development of cooperation on counteracting illegal 
weapons trafficking, the Executive Committee with the 
participation of SCO experts is finishing work on a draft 
agreement on cooperation between the governments of the SCO 
member-states in combating the trafficking of illegal 
weapons, ammunition, and explosive substances. 
 
      Along with what has been stated, contacts and joint 
actions of the SCO RATS with international organizations has 
strengthened.  These organizations include: the Collective 
Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Antiterrorist Center 
and Coordination Service of the Council of the Commanders of 
Border Guard Troops of the CIS member-states, the 
Antiterrorist Union of the OSCE Secretariat and the Office of 
the Coordinator of the OSCE Projects in Tashkent, the 
Regional Mission fo the Representative of the UNODC in 
Central Asia, the United Nations Counterterrorist Committee 
and the UNSC Committee for Sanctions Against Al-Qaida and the 
Taliban, Interpol, and diplomatic missions accredited in 
Uzbekistan.  All of this facilitated clarifying the 
approaches of these parties to the problem and to the search 
for areas of common interest permitting coordinated steps in 
the international arena to combat new challenges and threats. 
 
      As has already been mentioned, thanks to the measures 
that have been taken, we have been able to not only localize 
negative processes in the SCO region, but also to control 
them.  As a result of this, the situation remains stable and 
predictable, and this facilitates integrational processes and 
also the expansion of social-economic and cultural 
cooperation, i.e. solving those tasks that were determined by 
the Charter of the SCO. 
 
      The terrorist organizations will strive to complete 
their missions on the territories of the member-states of the 
SCO by finding gaps in the operating systems for providing 
security.  Taking this into account, in our opinion, it is 
necessary to further develop the effectiveness of combating 
new challenges and threats. 
 
      In 2008, the efforts of the Executive Committee 
 
directed at the creation of the "Single List of Terrorist, 
Separatist, and Extremist Organizations, the Activity of 
Which is Forbidden in all SCO Member-States," the completion 
of the "SCO Convention on Prevention of Terrorism" that will 
determine the procedures and criteria for labelling 
organizations as terrorist, separatist, and extremist, and 
the "Agreement on Preparation of Cadres for Antiterrorist 
Formations of the SCO Member-States" are at the final stage. 
 
 
      We, together with the appropriate authorities, are 
working on the issue of unifying the national normative legal 
bills on fighting terrorism that will allow creating a single 
approach in fighting international terrorism in the SCO 
member-states. 
 
      The work on preparation of information materials which 
analyze the aspirations, tendencies, forms, and methods of 
terrorist group activity which threaten the security of SCO 
member-states is being conducted purposefully.  The 
aforementioned materials are being sent to the appropriate 
authorities and will be published in the informational 
bulletins of the Executive Committee in a timely fashion. 
 
      Besides this, the forms and methods of implementation 
of propaganda work that reveals specific examples of the true 
goals of terrorist, separatism, and extremism are being 
refined. 
NORLAND