US embassy cable - 04THEHAGUE963

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 THE HAGUE 000963 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: EAIR, OVIP, EWWT, NL 
SUBJECT:  USDOT Secretary Mineta's Visit to the Netherlands 
April 4-5 
 
1.  Summary:   In a meeting with Dutch Transport Minister 
Karla Peijs, Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta 
explained the U.S. negotiating position in the current 
civair talks with the European Commission and asked for 
Dutch support with other member states to conclude an 
agreement.  He and the minister also reviewed such issues as 
road safety, traffic management, and inland waterways, 
offering to share experiences and exchange best practices on 
shared transportation problems.  The two also visited the 
Port of Rotterdam for a briefing on the port's security 
measures and the presentation of compliance certificates to 
five entities meeting the IMO's new International Ship and 
Port Security (ISPS) requirements, which become mandatory on 
July 1 of this year. 
 
End summary. 
 
2.  Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta visited the 
Netherlands April 4-5 for discussions with Dutch Minister of 
Transport and Water Management Peijs and a visit to the Port 
of Rotterdam.  During a 90-minute meeting with the Minister 
and several senior MOT staff, the Secretary reviewed and 
defended the US position in the US-EU civair negotiations. 
He explained that, although the US had initially preferred 
not to put anything on the table that would require 
legislative action, we were now prepared to go to the Hill 
to request an increase in the allowable foreign ownership of 
US carriers from 25 to 49 percent.  On cabotage, however, 
which he described as a "third rail" issue, the Secretary 
said that he had made it clear to Commissioner Loyola de 
Palacio that cabotage remained off the table.  The Secretary 
and Ambassador Sobel appealed to Minister Peijs for Dutch 
support for concluding an agreement and for helping to 
influence other member states, such as Germany, France, and 
Italy.   The Secretary commented that such support was 
particularly valuable in view of the fact that some parties 
would prefer to see no agreement at all.  Minister Peijs 
replied that the Netherlands was in favor of an agreement; 
she added, however, that other Europeans questioned U.S. 
intentions to go beyond the current talks to conclude 
subsequent agreements and were therefore reluctant to agree 
to anything short of a comprehensive deal. 
 
3.  When DOT Assistant Secretary for Aviation and 
International Affairs Karan Bhatia noted that asked whether 
some EU member states preferred not to see the Commission 
score a big victory in the civair talks, out of concern that 
this might advance the Commission's claims for competence 
vis--vis the member states regarding other issues, Ministry 
civair official Rene Fennes said that the Netherlands had no 
such problem, seeing civil aviation as a natural area for 
shared jurisdiction between the Commission and member 
states.  He also noted, and Minister Peijs concurred, that 
the Netherlands could undertake some "quiet diplomacy" to 
help facilitate internal EU consensus.  He added, however, 
that the Dutch had their own interests at stake in the 
negotiations and would have to proceed cautiously.  Minister 
Peijs added that she thought that the Commission made a 
better negotiating partner than the individual member states 
for the U.S. on civair issues, as it made the two sides 
better able to strike a balanced agreement.  A/S Bhatia 
commented that the U.S. had to proceed in a step-by-step 
manner in the talks and that accepting the idea of pan- 
European carriers, as exemplified by the KLM-Air France 
merger, had been a major issue for us. 
 
Road safety, better use of waterways 
------------------------------------- 
4.  Turning to other issues, the Secretary said that he was 
pleased that the World Health Organization had declared 
traffic accidents to be a major public health problem, which 
would help to focus greater attention on the issue.  He said 
that traffic accidents were the leading cause of death in 
the US for the 18-34 age group and cost the economy some 
$230 billion annually.  Accordingly, the President had 
issued a directive making made road safety a top 
administration priority, and DOT was attacking the problem 
on a variety of fronts.  For example, better highway 
engineering included such measures as rumble strips to alert 
drivers to when they were veering off the road, improved 
drainage to prevent hydroplaning and the loss of vehicle 
control, and better lighting and signaling.  The US is also 
pressing ahead with anti-alcohol campaigns and trying to 
raise seat belt usage to 90 percent from the current 79 
percent.  Twenty states now have `primary' seat belt laws 
that allow police officers to stop vehicles and issue 
citations for the lack of seat belt usage alone, rather than 
`secondary' laws that permit such citations only when 
drivers are stopped for some other cause.  Minister Peijs 
noted that the Netherlands had embarked on a public 
education campaign targeted at getting children in the habit 
of wearing seat belts, in the hope that they would then 
pressure their parents to do likewise. 
 
5.  The Minister also described the Netherlands' efforts to 
reduce overall congestion on the roads, particularly 
involving hazardous cargo.  She said that by 2007 there 
would be a new rail line to Germany dedicated to freight, 
which would be both faster and more efficient but also more 
amenable to control from a security standpoint.  Picking up 
on the theme of moving freight off the highways, the 
Secretary asked what the Netherlands is doing to promote 
 
SIPDIS 
short sea shipping.  He commented that, while there was 
considerable freight haulage along both the U.S. east and 
west coasts and in the Mississippi basin, the Netherlands is 
a leader in using both inland waterways and short sea 
shipping.  The Minister replied that an integrated port 
traffic management system encompassing both ocean-bound and 
inland shipping is vital for such operations, involving real- 
time information on ship and barge movements and their 
cargoes.  Both sides indicated a desire to continue sharing 
information on respective approaches to addressing traffic 
congestion, with Minister Peijs inviting the Department to 
send a representative to a conference on short sea shipping 
being convened in the Netherlands in May, and the Secretary 
inviting the Minister to meet with U.S. experts on road 
tolling and tour some tolling facilities when she visits the 
United States in October. 
 
Improving transportation security 
--------------------------------- 
6.  The Minister also noted the vital role of security in 
today's transportation system.  After the Secretary 
expressed appreciation for the Netherlands' early adoption 
of the Container Security Initiative at Rotterdam, Minister 
Peijs said that the Dutch had no regrets and saw the 
absolute necessity of protecting such important national 
assets as Schiphol Airport and the port of Rotterdam with 
the most advanced security measures available.  On the 
radiological monitors at Rotterdam, the Minister said that 
it had been bureaucratically difficult to get them approved, 
due to the number of ministries involved, but that the 
effort had been well worth it.  The Secretary then outlined 
the origin and development of the Transportation Security 
Administration and its eventual move into the Department of 
Homeland Security, adding that DOT retained responsibility 
for air safety issues via the FAA, issues which sometimes 
overlap with the security responsibilities of DHS. 
 
7.  The Minister then made a strong comment to the effect 
that, while the Netherlands of course saw the need for 
strict air security, the Dutch would like to have the 
opportunity to discuss with the U.S. how best to achieve it, 
rather than to receive unilateral directives.  On PNR, she 
said that her 14 years in the European Parliament had made 
her well aware of Europarliamentarians' sensitivities on 
privacy matters and suggested that a videoconference with 
DHS officials might help to allay some of their concerns. 
She also suggested that continuing communication efforts 
with MEPs would be necessary in view of the expected 
turnover of perhaps 60 percent in the European Parliamentary 
elections to be held in June.  Assistant Secretary Bhatia 
noted that some MEPs were scheduled to come to Washington 
this Spring in May and that this would be a good opportunity 
to further the dialogue. 
 
Visit to Port of Rotterdam 
-------------------------- 
8.  The Secretary and the Minister then proceeded to 
Rotterdam for a visit to its harbor control center and a 
boat tour of the port, the world's busiest in terms of 
tonnage handled annually.  Port officials provided an 
overview of the operations of the port, which extends some 
25 miles from the North Sea coast to the city of Rotterdam 
and which handles some 30,000 sea-going and over 100,000 
inland vessels per year.  The port's information system, 
displayed for the Secretary and the Minister, provides real- 
time GPS-based data on the movements of vessels entering, 
exiting, and moored at the port, with color coding used to 
mark those bearing hazardous cargoes.  The visit concluded 
with a trip through the port, during which certificates were 
presented by the Minister and Mayor of Rotterdam to five 
companies (operators of shipping lines, ship repair 
facilities, and port terminals) already in compliance with 
the International Maritime Organization's International Ship 
and Port Security (ISPS) code, due to go into effect on July 
1 of this year. 
SOBEL