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O 151320Z APR 09
FM AMEMBASSY KABUL
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 8400
INFO RUCNAFG/AFGHANISTAN COLLECTIVE IMMEDIATE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 KABUL 000941 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL MARR PTER AG
SUBJECT: CODEL TSONGAS:  MEETING WITH AFGHAN INTERIOR 
MINISTER ATMAR, APRIL 9, 2009 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary:  In an April 9 meeting with CODEL Tsongas, 
Interior Minister Atmar praised the U.S. Combined Security 
Transition Command-Afghanistan (CSTC-A) for the training it 
is providing to the Afghan National Police (ANP) and his 
ministry, described the training programs in some detail, and 
made a strong appeal for more support on ANP expansion.  He 
defended his record on anti-corruption by describing major 
initiatives he has taken to clean up the police force, 
especially its leadership, and to build capacity to go after 
high-level corruption (particularly through an envisioned 
"Major Crimes Task Force" (MCTF).  Atmar wove the theme of 
ANP expansion throughout his long, eloquent presentation. End 
Summary. 
 
 
ATMAR ON POLICE TRAINING AND EXPANSION OF THE ANP 
 
¶2. (SBU) On April 9, CODEL Tsongas met with Minister Hanif 
Atmar at the Interior Ministry (MOI).  The Minister expressed 
thanks to the United States for dispatching its "brave 
uniformed military" to Afghanistan and for continuing 
American support of the Afghan National Police (ANP), "often 
the only defense against terrorists and criminals."  Atmar 
said that, under CSTC-A's tutelage, the ANP was engaged in 
individual training and institution-building, with the police 
receiving a "full package, based on the best knowledge" for 
what they have to do. The three key Afghan security 
institutions are the Afghan National Army (ANA), the National 
Directorate of Security (NDS) intelligence, and the ANP.  The 
ANP had not yet achieved the success of the other two but, 
with the help of CSTC-A, would do so, Atmar said. 
 
¶3. (SBU) Atmar briefly described categories of police 
training.  He singled out the Focused District Development 
(FDD) program as the most important training provided by 
CSTC-A to the regular Afghan Uniformed Police (AUP).  Under 
FDD, local police are pulled from their districts for two 
months for drug testing, biometrics recording and training in 
basic skills.  When redeployed, the AUP units were the most 
critical element was the Police Mentor Teams (PMT) which 
accompanied the police on missions, ensured that the 
techniques they learned stuck, and relieved their sense of 
isolation.  Atmar commented that the ANA only fought when it 
was sure it had the ability to do so, Atmar said, but the 
regular ANP found they had no choice other than to fight. 
Atmar said the Afghan Border Police (ABP) also were training 
using the same principles as the AUP. Sixteen thousand ABP 
must receive that instruction.  The Minister said that the 
"most sophisticated" training, however, went to the elite 
Afghan Civil Order Police (ANCOP), which received 4 months of 
more intense and varied instruction. 
 
¶4. (SBU) In addition, Atmar said, the MOI and ANP received 
assistance on reforming traditional systems and 
institution-building, with an emphasis on rooting out 
corruption.  Selection of the leadership, which was not 
previously based on merit, was under a new system.  Atmar 
characterized the whole effort as "not just training, but 
fundamental reform of the entire structure."  This effort was 
complicated because the ANP was fully occupied fighting 
insurgents and eradicating poppy, doing security rather than 
law enforcement. And there were insufficient resources to 
expand the ANP rapidly in time for the August elections. 
 
¶5. (SBU)  Minister Atmar pitched strongly for ANP expansion. 
The ANP, he reiterated, must take a "quantum leap" forward, 
but resources were lacking.  Atmar said he received strong 
political support and understanding for what he was doing, 
such as firing and prosecuting 10 percent of the police 
leadership over the last four months, but he needed more 
trainers and mentors, as envisioned under President Obama's 
Strategic Review to create a bigger police force.  The ANP 
must be vastly expanded from its current size of 1.3 police 
for every 1000 Afghans, a ratio far below other countries 
which do not face insurgency, narcotics, and rapidly rising 
crime.  President Obama, he said, was clear when announcing 
the Strategic Review outcomes that he backed expansion of the 
Afghanistan National Security Forces (ANSF), but did not 
mention specific targets.  There was no shortage of 
volunteers for the ANP, which showed a measure of popular 
trust in the institution, but the Minister said that he 
needed international support to expand and train a new NCO 
and officer corps. 
 
FIGHTING CORRUPTION 
 
¶6. (SBU) Referring to an April 8 NY Times article "Corruption 
Undercuts Hopes for Afghan Police," the CODEL opened a 
discussion on that topic.  Atmar said he was aware of the 
article and that it was ironic that in Ghazni (from where it 
was date-lined), he had fired over 60 ANP, officers and 
 
KABUL 00000941  002 OF 003 
 
 
patrolmen, which had led to a 90 percent drop in reported 
corruption.  He defended his record by nothing that several 
major anti-corruption initiatives were underway within the 
MOI.  First, he had requested the FBI to build a Major Crimes 
Task Force (MCTF) in the MOI which would become 
"Afghanistan's FBI."  The FBI agreed and had begun work, but 
support from the CODEL and elsewhere for additional resources 
would help.  Once the structure is in place, the MCTF targets 
would go beyond senior police officers to Afghanistan's 
leadership in the Parliament and cabinet.  For seven years 
there had been much talk about bold steps to go after 
high-level corruption, but no resources were available, Atmar 
said.  His invitation to the FBI was to do this together with 
the MOI until MOI could do it alone. 
 
¶7. (SBU) A second major initiative, Atmar said, was his plan 
for a 300 person Afghan MOI inspector general (IG) corps to 
enforce accountability on personnel "ghosts" (police who are 
carried on the rolls but not active), weapons, salaries and 
performance at the district level.  He had asked the 
international community to deploy inspectors to train the IG 
candidates for this Afghan initiative, including a request he 
made to the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan 
Reconstruction (SIGAR).  He specifically wanted 34 
international auditors, one per province, who could monitor 
ANP performance and give the public confidence in ANP reform. 
 There were a number of institutional corruption problems, 
but the key, he said, was cleaning up the police leadership. 
If that were done there would be no diversion of assets.  To 
that end, he was requiring top leaders to explain their 
assets or risk prosecution.  He had provided his own personal 
data to the Afghan High Office of Oversight.  In addition, he 
was strengthening the police intelligence capacity to review 
the leadership and also asked the FBI to help with 
polygraphing. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Atmar apologized for explaining his approach on 
corruption at such length, but he was dealing with a historic 
problem.  He had witnessed that when the U.S. and others 
originally pressed for reform in the ANA and intelligence 
services, anyone fired from those organizations had moved to 
the ANP, where the U.S. was not involved at the time.  A 
blind eye had been turned when the focus was on the Afghan 
Army and he was now trying to get rid of people capable of 
mobilizing demonstrations if they felt threatened.  His 
point, he said, was that he was pursing a comprehensive 
strategy against corruption to bring about a cultural change, 
for which he needed resources. 
 
WOMEN IN THE ANP, ANCOP, AND MORE ON EXPANSION 
 
¶9. (SBU) CODEL Tsongas pressed on a number of other topics, 
such as the role of women in the ANP.  Atmar said that there 
was culturally already such a role, but he was not yet 
training enough women, and needed an aggressive recruitment 
and training program for women.  He said that he would draw 
on the experience of CSTC-A's BG Armstrong, a woman, for this 
program.  There were 700 women in the ANP in a taskhil of 82 
thousand.  He then used his chalkboard to outline the whole 
organization of the ANP in greater detail  Asked about the 
ANCOP role, Atmar said they were gendarmerie-like police, 
charged with handling civil unrest (while the AUP handled 
community-level policing).  ANCOP's special role was in the 
FDD program.  When AUP police were overwhelmed and in need of 
training, ANCOP substituted for them in the districts while 
the AUP went through the FDD program.  He explained that in 
rural areas, the ANA was often not present, so there the ANP 
was used almost entirely for security, not law enforcement. 
 
¶10. (SBU) Atmar turned the conversation back to ANP 
expansion, estimating that he needed roughly a doubling of 
the ANP in two years, preferably one, to fight a brutal enemy 
and simultaneously reform the police and ministry.  He 
illustrated the brutality of the enemy by recounting the 
story of how early in 2009 young girls had had acid sprayed 
in their faces while walking to school.  He asserted that 
this was the work of a Pakistan army major who had paid 
assailants USD 2000 for every girl sprayed.  Taliban crossing 
from Pakistan were armed with heavy machine guns, which made 
the ANP "sitting ducks".  He acknowledged that he was 
training soldiers, not police in the traditional sense, but 
that was necessary under the circumstances. The equipment 
provided by the U.S. was welcome, and indeed, for the first 
time ever the Aghanistan people welcomed foreign troops, not 
simply because the Taliban were so bad, but because the 
values shown by American soldiers were admirable.  The U.S. 
had provided eight major training centers, and there were 
other sites around the country, including a police academy in 
Kabul,but still more help was required.  His dream project, 
he said, was to staff the academy with U.S. trainers as 
faculty members, including women officers. 
 
KABUL 00000941  003 OF 003 
 
 
 
WHO ELSE IS HELPING ON POLICE TRAINING? 
 
¶11. (SBU) Asked which other countries could or were helping 
with police training, Atmar rattled off an answer.  France 
was particularly good, but its offer was small.  Italy was a 
relatively large contributor (a distant second after the 
U.S.) with its carbinieri trainers.  Canada was small and 
centered on Kandahar.  The U.K. focused more on 
counter-narcotics. The Dutch were good, but too few in 
numbers.  Germany was a "fantastic" contributor to many 
aspects of the ANP, but also too small a contingent.  From 
Islamic neighboring nations only money was needed.  The 
picture was captured when you considered that of the 55 FDD 
districts, all were partnered by the U.S. except 4-5 by other 
nations.  Atmar concluded by saying increasing the size of 
the ANP before elections was pressing.  Afghans are willing 
to join the ANP as soldiers, gendarmerie, or community 
police, but the money, training spaces, and trainers are not 
yet available.  When Congressman  said a constituent in 
Duchess County who had lost a brother on his third tour of 
service had urged him to "make it worth it," Atmar said that 
was absolutely right.  Every night, he said, he looked at the 
ANP losses and felt an ethical responsibility to build a 
prepared and reformed ANP.  This was a winnable goal if the 
right decisions were made. 
 
¶12. (U) Participants: Minister Atmar was accompanied to this 
meeting by his Chief of Staff, Mr. Wayand, and a military 
aide.  On the U.S. side, Rep. Niki Tsongas (D-MA), Rep. John 
Hall (D-NY), Rep. Larry Kissell (D-NC), Rep. Jared Polis 
(D-CO), Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), 
Staff members Bob DeGrasse and Josh Holly, CDA Ambassador 
Frank Ricciardone, CSTC-A BG Anne Macdonald, and Embassy 
POL-MIL Counselor Bob Clarke participated. 
 
¶13. (U) CODEL Tsongas did not review this cable before 
departure. 
 
 
 
 
 
RICCIARDONE