VZCZCXRO3447
OO RUEHBC RUEHDBU RUEHDE RUEHDIR RUEHKUK RUEHTRO
DE RUEHUNV #0226/01 1331539
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 131539Z MAY 09
FM USMISSION UNVIE VIENNA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 9461
INFO RUCNIRA/IRAN COLLECTIVE IMMEDIATE
RUCNNAR/VIENNA NARCOTICS COLLECTIVE IMMEDIATE
RUEHIL/AMEMBASSY ISLAMABAD IMMEDIATE 0255
RUEHBUL/AMEMBASSY KABUL IMMEDIATE 0288

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 UNVIE VIENNA 000226 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/13/2023 
TAGS: PREL SNAR IR PAK AF
SUBJECT: UNODC/IRAN:  SLOWLY MOVING FORWARD ON REGIONAL 
COOPERATION 
 
REF: A. UNVIE VIENNA 00117 
     ¶B. UNVIE VIENNA 00173 
 
Classified By: Charge d'Affaires Geoffrey Pyatt for reasons 1.4 (c) and 
 (e) 
 
¶1.  (C)   Summary.  UNODC Head of the Europe and Central/West 
Asia Office Roberto Arbitrio on May 13 briefed Msnoffs on his 
trip the prior week to Afghanistan and Iran.  Although the 
trip did not yield much substantive progress, it appears that 
joint counternarcotics cooperation under the Triangular 
Initiative continues to move forward, and Iran, Pakistan, and 
Afghanistan are still working to do a second joint 
counternarcotics operation by late June.  Arbitrio speculated 
that despite U.S. movement toward engagement, Iran may not be 
able or willing to respond until fall or later and certainly 
will not take any steps before the presidential elections 
next month.  Already, Iran has ended its willingness to have 
substantive dialogue on new counternarcotics initiatives with 
UNODC.  End Summary. 
 
----------------------------------- 
UNODC Meetings Make Little Progress 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (C)   UNODC Head of the Europe and Central/West Asia 
Office Roberto Arbitrio on May 13 told Msnoffs that the prior 
week's meeting in Kabul, which he attended with UNODC 
Executive Director Antonio Costa, was the second meeting of 
the "Tripartite Initiative" involving Iran, Afghanistan, and 
the UN.  Arbitrio noted that the Tripartite Initiative was 
formed at the behest of Iran about a year ago and the May 
meeting was also held at Tehran's initiative.  Arbitrio 
described this forum as part of Iran's increased interest in 
being actively engaged with Afghanistan and getting 
recognition for doing so.  He noted that Iran probably wanted 
to "position itself" on Afghanistan and increase its 
leverage, but felt that a UN umbrella would make its outreach 
more successful. 
 
¶3.  (C)   Overall, Arbitrio dubbed the meeting "not 
particularly interesting," though Iran promised bilateral 
assistance to Afghanistan, including a training course for 
Afghan police.  (Comment:  There is no indication that this 
is different from the prior Iranian proposal of training for 
Afghan police.  End Comment.)  Arbitrio noted that Iran would 
like to offer the course at its new training center in Iran 
which it sees as state of the art.  This complex also is 
where the Triangular Initiative's Joint Planning Cell is 
hosted. 
 
¶4.  (C)   As part of this trip, Arbitrio and Costa also met 
with the governor of Herat and an Italian PRT there and 
visited a counternarcotics checkpoint near Herat where they 
met the commander of Afghanistan's border patrol and U.S. 
advisors to Afghanistan's forces (septel). 
 
¶5.  (C)   Although Costa left the region through Iran, he 
held no meetings there.  Arbitrio remained in Iran to 
introduce his colleague Antonino de Leo to the Iranian 
interlocutors he worked with during his recent four and a 
half year post in Tehran.  (Note:  De Leo is on a three-month 
TDY to run the UNODC office in Tehran and has applied with 
UNODC to remain in Iran as the head of UNODC's Iran programs 
there.  End Note.)  None of these meetings were substantive, 
Arbitrio said, because Iran's policies are frozen until after 
the presidential elections next month, and we probably will 
not see movement until the September to December time frame. 
Nevertheless, he speculated that Iran probably would not 
"spoil" an opportunity for engagement with the U.S. before 
then if in its interests, though it probably cannot act or 
change its policy until at least late fall.  We could see 
additional signals in the interim, such as the release of 
Saberi, but a signal is different than a change in policy. 
Most members of the Iranian establishment are acting with 
extreme caution until a new administration is in place, but 
the Iranian leadership probably already has some ideas and 
new policies that are on the shelf until after the election. 
Arbitrio noted that he makes clear to his Iranian 
interlocutors that they currently have an opportunity that 
they should take advantage of if they want to re-integrate 
into the international community and that this door will not 
be open forever.  His sense is that Iran knows that there is 
an "urgency" to discuss "certain issues," so they will be 
reluctant to truly let these opportunities pass by. 
 
----------------------------------- 
Moving Forward on Regional Programs 
----------------------------------- 
 
UNVIE VIEN 00000226  002 OF 002 
 
 
 
¶6.  (C)   The Iranian delegation to the Tripartite Initiative 
meetings in Kabul--which included Iranian Ambassador to 
Afghanistan Maleki, Iranian Deputy Secretary General of 
Iran's Drug Control Headquarters Taheri, and head of Iran's 
Anti-Narcotics Police Hossein-Abadi--also planned to discuss 
with Afghan officials future operations under the Triangular 
Initiative, though UNODC did not take part in these meetings. 
 Afghanistan still has not completed its own "lessons 
learned" exercise evaluating the March 8 joint 
counternarcotics operation (ref A), but Arbitrio hopes that a 
review exercise with Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, as well 
as a second joint operation can take place before the third 
ministerial meeting of the Triangular Initiative, which is 
tentatively set for June 21-24 in Islamabad (Pakistan is 
still waiting for a response from Iran on the dates).  The 
Pakistani Anti-Narcotics Forces have developed an operational 
plan for the second joint operation and plan to take the 
lead.  A workshop on communications requirements for the 
Triangular Initiative is also being planned because of the 
inability for the three national forces to communicate during 
the March operation.  Pakistan has passed out a questionnaire 
to all three states, but Arbitrio suspects that Iran is 
unlikely to participate given its sensitivities about its 
radio communications equipment.  Tehran's suspicions of other 
states' interference in its communications equipment also 
will prevent Iran from accepting or using any communications 
equipment not manufactured in Iran in Arbitrio's opinion.  In 
addition, by the end of the month, Afghanistan plans to send 
a full-time drug liaison officer to the Joint Planning Cell 
for the first time, which Arbitrio sees as an important step 
forward. 
 
¶7.  (C)   In addition, UNODC currently is developing a 
regional program proposal from the Rainbow Strategy to 
present at the June G8 meeting in Trieste.  UNODC plans to 
create a regional coordination unit based in Vienna to 
backstop and support regional integration as its programs 
move more in that direction.  Arbitrio expects that the 
coordination unit will be led by a steering committee that 
will create action plans for regional programs. 
 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
Iranian/UNODC Priorities for Drug Demand Reduction 
--------------------------------------------- ----- 
 
¶8.  (C)   Arbitrio noted that UNODC's priorities for drug 
demand reduction programs as reflected in the presentation 
its officials gave in late April (ref B) are reflective of 
Iran's priorities as well, but he would focus on three issues 
for funding in this category:  prevention, advocacy, and 
treatment.  He argued that prevention and advocacy programs 
are important because they are essentially civil society 
programs and help to support NGOs and keep them engaged in 
Iran. In general, Iran is still not interested in receiving 
bilateral assistance, but prefers to work through UNODC. 
 
¶9.  (C)   Arbitrio also reiterated that the language we use 
when working with Iran on counternarcotics issues is 
important to engagement.  For example, the UNODC always 
speaks of "partnership" with Iran, rather than "assistance" 
to Iran when speaking to Iranian officials.  Discussion of 
assistance to Iran always shuts down Iran's willingness to 
engage.  However, Iran is able to be in give and receive 
modes on counterdrug issues and sees prestige in both hosting 
regional workshops, since Iran is seen as the center for 
South-South cooperation, and going to international top-level 
drug control programs for "exchanges" through which Iran 
would learn from other experts without admitting to being in 
a lesser contributing role.  Iran is very interested in both 
kinds of exchange. 
PYATT