VZCZCXRO8216
PP RUEHFL RUEHLA RUEHMRE RUEHROV RUEHSR
DE RUEHVEN #0271/01 3161417
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 111417Z NOV 08
FM USMISSION USOSCE
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 6031
INFO RUCNOSC/ORG FOR SECURITY CO OP IN EUR COLLECTIVE
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 0632
RUEHUNV/USMISSION UNVIE VIENNA 1187
RHMFISS/CDR USEUCOM VAIHINGEN GE
RHMFISS/CDRUSAREUR HEIDELBERG GE
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHDLCNE/CINCUSNAVEUR LONDON UK
RUEKDIA/DIA WASHDC
RUEASWA/DTRA ALEX WASHINGTON DC
RUESDT/DTRA-OSES DARMSTADT GE
RHMFISS/HQ USCENTCOM MACDILL AFB FL
RUEKJCS/JCS WASHDC
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHDC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC
RUEHGV/USMISSION GENEVA 1127

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 USOSCE 000271 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR VCI/CCA, VCI/NRRC, EUR/RPM, EUR/SCE 
JCS FOR J-5 
OSD FOR ISA (PERENYI) 
NSC FOR HAYES 
USUN FOR LEGAL, POL 
EUCOM FOR J-5 
CENTCOM FOR J-5 
UNVIE FOR AC 
GENEVA FOR CD 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/10/2018 
TAGS: PARM PREL KCFE OSCE ZL
SUBJECT: DAYTON ART. IV: 41ST SRCC A COOPERATIVE SUCCESS 
 
REF: PODGORICA 0261 
 
Classified By: Chief Arms Control Delegate Hugh Neighbour for reasons 1 
.4(b) and (d) 
 
¶1. (U) Summary: The 41st Dayton Article IV Sub-Regional 
Consultative Commission (SRCC) met October 14-15 in 
Montenegro and included the signing of key amendments to the 
agreement that formally integrated Montenegro into the treaty 
as an independent state party.  Four decisions were taken, 
which included agreements to publish an operational handbook 
for inspectors, to increase the timeframe for arms in the 
status for export from two to four years, to use Automated 
Data Systems software for developing the Annual Exchange of 
Information, and an agreement to the obligatory use of the 
Integrated Notification Application (INA) beginning January 
1, 2009.  (NOTE: Dayton Article IV was established in 1996 
and is patterned after the treaty on Conventional Armed 
Forces in Europe.  It is a successful arms control regime 
under the auspices of the OSCE for what now are four states 
of the former Yugoslavia: Bosnia and Herzegovina, the 
Republic of Croatia, Montenegro, and the Republic of Serbia. 
END NOTE.)  End Summary 
 
Serbians Show Up As Expected 
---------------------------- 
 
¶2. (C) There was early speculation among the contact group 
that Serbia might not send its delegation to the SRCC because 
just days before the scheduled SRCC, Montenegro and Macedonia 
recognized the independence of Kosovo.  This turned out to be 
a non-issue as the Kosovo issue was never discussed and 
Serbian Ambassador Branka Latinovic and Lieutenant Colonel 
Navakovic were present at the opening dinner on the evening 
of  October 13. 
 
¶3. (U) The 41st Dayton Article IV SRCC, held in a sea-side 
resort on Montenegro's Adriatic coast was chaired by 
Montenegrin Ambassador Milorad Scepanovic.  Assisting him in 
maintaining the flow and direction of the forum was the OSCE 
Chairman-in-Office's Personal Representative (PR) for Dayton 
Article IV Brigadier General Costanzo Periotto.  The contact 
group was fully attended by a representative each from 
France, Germany, Italy, Russia, the UK and the U.S. 
 
¶4. (SBU) The SRCC began with opening remarks and the adoption 
of the past minutes. The adoption of one set of minutes in 
particular was initially postponed due to disagreements over 
the language and edits in the text.  This led to a lengthy 
discussion on the need for specificity in the text of the 
minutes, illustrated when the delegation from Bosnia and 
Herzegovina (BiH) corrected the Montenegrin delegation's work 
on the minutes by requesting that its armed forces be 
referred to in the minutes as the "Armed Forces of Bosnia and 
Herzegovina" and not simply as the Bosnian Army. 
 
Amendments and Signing Ceremony: No Media Please 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
 
¶5. (SBU) The Parties then turned to the business of a 
ceremonial signing of several Amendments to the Agreement. 
The Amendments, once signed, codified Montenegro's status as 
an individual Party to the Article IV agreement.   The 
Parties previously accepted Decision 1/39 in October 2007, 
which endorsed a July 2007 bilateral agreement between Serbia 
and Montenegro, dividing Article IV armament entitlements 
 
USOSCE 00000271  002 OF 004 
 
 
between the two Parties and allowing Montenegro to 
participate in the agreement as a party separate from Serbia. 
 
¶6. (C) Before the Parties were able to relocate to a nearby 
room for the formal signing ceremony as planned, a small 
group of reporters, including one carrying a large video 
camera, streamed into the ongoing SRCC session.  Serbian 
Ambassador Latinovic quickly protested the media's presence, 
saying that the Parties had not been notified that the media 
had been invited.  She asked the chairman to order all press 
representatives to leave the room, which they then did. 
(COMMENT: The Serbian Ambassador was visibly agitated at this 
development, almost certainly because she was nearly 
photographed and videotaped representing Serbia in a 
diplomatic event in Montenegro just days after Montenegro 
recognized Kosovo's independence.  Serbia, in response, had 
expelled Montenegro's Ambassador to Belgrade.  END COMMENT.) 
 
¶7. (SBU) Soon after the controversy over the media, the 
Amendments were signed by all Parties in a nearby room with 
smiles and champagne, but the only fanfare came from the 
snapping of pictures from representatives' personal digital 
cameras.  (NOTE: On October 13, an estimated 10,000 people in 
the Montenegrin capital of Podgorica protested Montenegro's 
October 9 decision to recognize Kosovo's independence 
(reftel).  The pro-Serb rally, which was extensively covered 
in the local media, turned violent and led to 30 people 
suffering minor injuries. END NOTE.) 
 
Decision 1/41: Though We Agree, Let's Continue To Disagree 
--------------------------------------------- ------------- 
 
¶8. (C) The next agenda item involved an issue that at first 
appeared to most as minor but which soon elicited testy back 
and forth disagreements, many of which were initiated by the 
Serbian delegation.  The issue involved the status of 
publication of an operational handbook for Dayton Article IV 
inspectors and a companion publication of the so called 
"compendium," which is a brief written history of the 
agreement itself. 
 
¶9. (C) The Serbian position, based on the text of a previous 
decision, 3/40, was that both documents were to be part of a 
single publication.  The other parties, including the PR 
recognized that both would not be ready for publication at 
the same time and General Periotto recommended as a 
compromise for the Parties to publish the operational 
handbook first, because it was nearly completed, and to 
continue work on the compendium.  After a hour of heated back 
and forth bickering about positions and which delegation was 
being more flexible, the Serbians eventually agreed to the 
compromise saying "I believe this shows maximum flexibility 
unlike the Croatian decision."  The Chair, trying to minimize 
the growing tensions, interrupted with the statement that 
"each party has the right to remain inconclusive."  Despite 
the appearance of almost complete agreement among the parties 
on the issue, the BiH delegation proposed that discussion on 
the issue be suspended until the next morning because "the 
morning is a much smarter period."  All agreed to delay the 
dialogue on the publication until the next day, and the 
following morning the decision was quickly adopted with no 
substantive debate or disagreement. 
 
The Other Three Decisions 
------------------------- 
 
 
USOSCE 00000271  003 OF 004 
 
 
¶10.  (SBU) The next decision, 2/41, increasing the timeframe 
for "arms in the status for export" from two to four years 
was agreed to very quickly.  The only dissenting opinion 
during discussions came from the PR's office.  Retired German 
Lieutenant Colonel Helmut Kruse offered his opinion that 
during the last SRCC, Decision 4/40 increased the timeframe 
for the same armaments from one to two years and now that all 
wanted a four-year timeframe, he questioned whether this met 
the legally binding rule of being a temporary timeframe. 
Montenegro weighed in saying that it was now at the end of 
the existing two year limit and did not want weapons 
currently in export status to be discounted if the timeframe 
were to be surpassed.  General Periotto allowed that four 
years may not be temporary but that if all the Parties were 
happy with the decision, then he was happy with it as well. 
 
¶11. (C) The third and fourth decisions were adopted with 
little debate.  Decision 3/41 involved agreement on the use 
of Automated Data Systems (ADS) for Dayton Article IV data 
exchanges.  (NOTE: ADS is currently used to support data 
exchanges for the CFE treaty, the Vienna Document 1999, and 
the Global Exchange of Military Information. END NOTE.)  The 
only concern was raised privately among members of the 
contact group and it regarded the source of the funding, a 
concern that went unresolved after a brief sidebar between 
the contact group and members of the PR's office. 
 
¶12. (SBU) Decision 4/41 agreeing to the obligatory use of the 
Integrated Notification Applications (INA) for all Parties 
beginning January 1, 2009 met with only brief concern from 
the BiH delegation, which wanted to ensure language 
permitting alternate means of communication if the INA 
process were to break down.  (NOTE: The purpose of the INA, 
which is already in use for inspections and activity related 
to the CFE treaty, the Open Skies treaty, and the Vienna 
Document 1999, is to ensure a direct communications link 
between the state parties to send and receive messages and 
notifications for Dayton Article IV operations.  END NOTE.) 
German Lieutenant Colonel Detlef Hempel from the PR's Office 
responded that there was no need for specific language in the 
decision regarding this concern: should there be a technical 
problem with the INA, it was expected that all would use a 
telephone, fax, or other means to ensure effective 
communication. 
 
Let's Not Actually "Involve" the Media 
-------------------------------------- 
 
¶13. (C) The Parties then discussed the future role of the 
media in SRCC affairs.  Having had the SRCC forum marred by 
the presence of the media the previous day, which the 
Montenegro chair admittedly had not cleared with the rest of 
the delegations, the Parties found renewed reason to settle 
on an approach to working with the media.  Serbia and Croatia 
were unified in the position that SRCC meetings are closed 
meetings of experts and therefore should never be open to 
media coverage.  Ambassador Latinovic recommended that the 
Parties refer to the act of "informing" the media of SRCC 
matters rather than "introducing" the media into Article IV 
affairs.  She further suggested that a system for handling 
the media was not needed and that it should be dealt with on 
a case-by-case basis.  Latinovic ended her statement by 
regretfully relaying to the Parties that her name had been 
mentioned in the press on October 14 as being the individual 
responsible for denying media coverage of the previous day's 
SRCC activities. 
 
USOSCE 00000271  004 OF 004 
 
 
 
The Inspection Regime Still Works 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶14. (SBU) The final issues discussed were an analysis of the 
inspection regime for the first half of 2008 and a review of 
the minimum number of quotas for the 2009 inspection regime. 
The Parties expressed unanimous satisfaction with the 
inspection regime thus far in 2008.  Highlighting improvement 
in the process from the previous year, Montenegro summarized 
its activity in the first half of the year as having 
implemented two passive inspections and three active 
inspections in Serbia and BiH and saying it had no disputable 
issues.  Discussion then turned to the issue of quotas for 
¶2009. Initially BiH, Croatia, and Montenegro favored 
maintaining for 2009 the same number of quotas existing in 
the 2008 inspection regime.  Serbia requested a slight 
decrease in the number of quotas reducing its passive quota 
from seven to six and Montenegro's active quota from four to 
three. All Parties then unanimously agreed to this change and 
the change was adopted. 
 
¶15. (U) General Periotto stated that his office planned to 
organize an exhibition in February 2009 to mark the success 
of the Dayton Article IV agreement, with an emphasis on the 
completion of the 300th inspection.  He recommended an 
opening ceremony which would include speeches by him and the 
future presiding chair from Croatia and a photo presentation 
of the 12 years of implementation of the agreement.  All 
agreed to the idea and to support the effort. 
 
Future Meetings 
--------------- 
 
¶16. (U) The next Dayton Article IV Extraordinary Consultative 
Commission will take place December 11 at the Hofburg Palace 
in Vienna, Austria with Croatia as the next chair.  All 
Parties also agreed to February 18, 2009 as the date of the 
next permanent working group and as the date of the proposed 
Dayton Article IV exhibition. 
General Periotto and the Montenegrin Ambassador then made a 
joint statement they referred to as a serious one: that 
everyone must watch the World Cup soccer match that evening 
between Italy and Montenegro.  Unsurprisingly, Italy defeated 
Montenegro 2-1 in an uneventful contest. 
SCOTT