US embassy cable - 05MADRID960

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 MADRID 000960 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPARTMENT PASS TO NEA/FO FOR KING MALLORY, EUR/ERA FOR 
LOUIS BONO, EUR/WE 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/08/2015 
TAGS: PREL, PGOV, SP 
SUBJECT: BMENA - POSSIBILITY FOR COOPERATION WITH SPAIN 
 
Classified By: POL Kathy Fitzpatrick for reasons 1.4(b) and (d) 
 
1.(C) SUMMARY: NEA DAS Carpenter met with Spanish MFA 
officials, including Political Director Rafael Dezcallar, 
Barcelona Process Ambassador Juan Prat and Near East Division 
DAS-equivalent Alberto Moreno, in Madrid on March 7 as part 
of the effort to forge greater U.S.-Spain and U.S.-EU 
cooperation on BMENA. The Spanish officials support 
coordination and division of labor, if the U.S. and EU 
political messages to the region are similar. Madrid prefers 
coordination on the national or sub-regional level. Greater 
explanation of the benefits and provision of incentives for 
democracy and reform is key. Madrid believes that the 
Islamist PJD will win Morocco's 2007 elections and that 
agreement is needed on how to engage Islamists in BMENA. A 
solution to W. Sahara is key to providing the economic growth 
needed in N. Africa and a new representative is needed.  FM 
Moratinos will ask for greater inclusion of Spain in G-8 
BMENA activities from Secretary Rice during his visit to 
Washington in April. He will also suggest that Middle East 
liaison officers be posted in Washington and Madrid and will 
request a formal annual dialog to exchange views on the 
Middle East at that time. END SUMMARY 
 
2.(C) NEA DAS Scott Carpenter held a day long series of 
meetings at the MFA in Madrid March 7th with: Policy Director 
Rafael Dezcallar, MFA Barcelona Process Ambassador Juan Prat 
and divisional Deputy DGs Carlos Fernandez-Arias (N. Africa), 
Antonio Moreno (ME) and Manual del la Camara (N. America). 
The purpose of the meetings was to elicit Spanish support for 
greater U.S.-EU cooperation on policy and assistance 
programming in the Broader Middle East and to discover the 
GOS's views on how democracy and reform can be promoted 
effectively in the region. 
 
3.(C) DAS Carpenter stated that the USG was interested in 
lessons that the GOS has learned from the 10-year Barcelona 
process. He asked if Spain was happy with the results and 
what its view is on attaching greater conditionality to 
foreign assistance. Carpenter asked the GOS about the 
possible scope for greater consultation and coordination 
between the U.S. and EU on political messages and foreign 
assistance programming in BMENA.  He explained that the USG 
had concluded that it had contributed to the causes of 
violence by over-emphasizing regional stability in the past. 
The USG allowed BMENA governments to suppress and drive 
political opposition to violence. The USG now believes that 
greater democracy is needed in the region in order to coax 
political opposition into the mainstream and away from 
violence.  Some short-term instability may therefore be 
needed to achieve the long-term stability that both the USG 
and the GOS are seeking in BMENA. 
 
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Strategic Overview 
------------------ 
 
4.(C) Policy Director Dezcallar started off by reminding DAS 
Carpenter that Spain is active in every region of the world 
but the Far East. Latin America and the Mediterranean are 
strategic for Spain.  Within the Mediterranean, North Africa 
and Palestine are areas of particular strategic interest. 
The EU's Barcelona Process is a Spanish creation: "we have to 
find a way to put the two contexts together ... BMENA and 
Barcelona can be perfect complements". 
 
5.(C) Dezcallar argued that the USG would gain by involving 
Spain in the G-8 BMENA initiative either ad hoc in discrete 
programs and activities or by inviting Spain to participate 
in the forthcoming Forum for the Future meeting in Bahrain in 
some manner.  He intimated that FM Moratinos will ask 
Secretary Rice to find a way to be more inclusive of Spain in 
 
SIPDIS 
the G-8 BMENA process in his forthcoming April visit to 
Washington. 
 
6.(C) Dezcallar said it is important to update the content of 
the Barcelona Process. Spain fully supports the new European 
Neighborhood Policy whereby the EU's previously separate East 
European and Mediterranean assistance programs will be 
combined and "action plans" are being developed for each 
beneficiary country along the EU's periphery. In an allusion 
to the competition for resources between Southern EU members 
focused on the Mediterranean and new EU members focused on 
Eastern Europe, Dezcallar stated that a lot more money would 
be required to make the Neighborhood Policy successful. He 
noted that the GOS had committed to increase foreign 
assistance from 0.25 to 0.50 percent of GDP, in this 
connection. 
 
7.(C) As long as the political messages being delivered to 
the BMENA region are similar, the GOS fully supports 
coordination of U.S. and EU foreign assistance and sees room 
for a division of labor between the U.S. and EU.  (Comment: 
How much movement is required from either side towards the 
other in order to make the messages similar was left 
unclear.) Dezcallar suggested including some statement on 
cooperation in the forthcoming 10th anniversary celebration 
of the Transatlantic Agenda. 
 
8.(C) The key to success in Dezcallar's view is to convince 
BMENA countries that democracy and more aggressive economic, 
educational, and social reforms are in their interest. The 
GOS can facilitate the reception of the political message due 
to the particular nature of its relations with BMENA 
countries. He pointed out that the way in which the political 
message is packaged is very important in the Arab world. 
 
9.(C) Dezcallar closed discussion of BMENA by suggesting that 
the USG and GOS post Middle East liaison officers in their 
respective embassies and that the GOS and USG meet formally 
once a year to exchange views on the Middle East. (COMMENT: 
By seeking closer coordination with the USG on BMENA, Spain 
may be attempting both to put itself on a par with Paris and 
London and to gain leverage in the intra-European competition 
for resources. Madrid may think that BMENA is more important 
currently to the USG than assistance to E. Europe. The GOS 
may thus believe that by having greater insight into USG 
thinking it can sway EU foreign assistance resource 
allocation decisions towards N. Africa. END COMMENT). 
 
10.(C) Finally, Dezcallar touched on PM Zapatero's "Alliance 
of Civilizations" initiative. U/S Dobriansky has been briefed 
on the concept by the GOS and UN SecGen Annan will soon 
announce a high-level group (HLG) in support of the 
initiative. He argued that the initiative would allow the 
ideas behind BMENA to be extrapolated to the UN context. The 
message on the need for reform in the Islamic world would 
arrive not just from the North but from Islamic countries of 
the South who had themselves been the victims of terror. The 
GOS will send a special ambassador to the U.S. to explain the 
concept in detail. Spain would like the USG to participate in 
the HLG and will formally request such participation during 
Moratinos' forthcoming visit. 
 
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The Barcelona Process 
--------------------- 
 
11.(C) Barcelona Process ambassador Juan Prat led off a 
session with N. Africa, ME and N. America Deputy DGs 
Fernandez-Arias, Moreno and de la Camara by stating that the 
U.S. and EU shared the same goal of accelerating reform but 
had differing approaches.  Calling for greater efficiency in 
the execution of assistance from the Commission, Prat stated 
that Barcelona had been a big success, despite the fact that 
it had not achieved all of its goals. 
 
12.(C) Little progress has been made in Barcelona's political 
and security "basket", because it has become "polluted" by 
lack of progress on the peace process.  And Barcelona has not 
achieved the expansion of civil society in the region, which 
the GOS seeks.  The economic and financial basket, by 
contrast, has been a success.  Morocco, Tunisia and Jordan 
have launched structural adjustment programs.  The EU is 
successfully pushing greater private sector involvement and 
trade between the Southern Med and Europe has risen by 30%. 
The EU is not spending enough on Barcelona's educational and 
cultural basket and redressing this defect will be a priority 
of the British EU presidency. Prat stressed the need to 
increase exchanges and projects targeting women's 
empowerment, in this connection. 
 
13.(C) Prat reiterated the GOS view that the U.S. and EU have 
to coordinate more closely. The national and sub-regional 
levels would likely be the most fruitful area in which to 
achieve concrete results. 
 
14.(C) The GOS is concerned that pushing democratization in 
countries with no tradition of democracy could lead to the 
election of Islamists. Carpenter pointed out that one could 
either provide a safety valve for social discontent now, or 
face dealing with more radical Islamists later. According to 
Prat, the GOS position is "yes" to accelerating political 
reform. "We can't have a second Algeria. We have to let the 
Islamists come into power", seconded Moreno. However, a 
debate is underway in Europe on how to handle the Islamic 
groups that will inevitably gain representation or control. 
Should the EU start dealing with moderate Islamists? Is there 
such a thing as moderate Islamists? If so, can they be 
trusted? The EU needs a common position. Camara noted that 
the prospect of EU accession had provided a check on 
Islamists in Turkey and had provided a strong means by which 
to justify difficult reforms to the Turkish people. 
15.(C) BMENA governments and populations have to be given 
something similar to look forward to - something that they 
could not achieve without undertaking the difficult reforms 
being asked of them.  The U.S. and EU have to exert pressure 
to start reforms, but also have to show how these reforms 
will lead to well being. The U.S. and EU need to think 
together how they can provide incentives. It will need a lot 
of money. Moreno noted that the EU has traditionally been 
poor at attaching credible conditions when providing funds 
and argued that much more thought is required on striking the 
right balance between too much and too little pressure. 
 
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North African Roundup 
--------------------- 
 
16.(C) After pointing out that N. Africans distrust BMENA, 
because they do not understand it, Fernandez-Arias focused on 
two macroscopic challenges: Western Sahara and housing. He 
highlighted the need to create mortgage markets if housing is 
ever to be produced in the volume required by demographic 
pressure. Western Sahara is preventing the sub-regional 
integration needed to make N. Africa an attractive market for 
investors and is therefore the principal impediment to 
kick-starting much needed economic growth. "We need a 
Baker-style representative ... When Baker was there things 
were moving because he could get White House attention. So 
Morocco and Algeria showed interest". 
 
17.(C) Algeria is not particularly interested in EuroMed or 
BMENA. The Algerians, according to Arias, don't need money 
and don't want pressure. 
 
18.(C) Morocco on the other hand needs money and is willing 
to accept conditionality, as long as it is done in a way that 
does not injure national pride. Spain is not getting the 
results it wants in Morocco.  Political and economic reforms 
are happening, but they are not touching the lives of 
ordinary people. This exacerbates the gap between rich and 
poor and Islamists are gaining in popularity as a result. The 
GOS believes that the PJD will win Morocco's 2007 elections. 
It would be a mistake to see the PJD in purely Islamic terms. 
The party is equally focused on economic reform, social 
services and social justice. Spain would like to see a joint 
focus on these topics and does not believe that extreme 
liberalization is the way to achieve results.  "We are not 
talking to the right people. We need to talk to religious 
parties who have a social base and have been meeting the 
demands of the people". 
 
19.(C) Tunisia is of lower strategic importance to Spain. It 
has resisted the EuroMed political dialog. "We want to see 
elections, not 99% victories".  The GOS pointed to Tunisia's 
dependence on Europe for 95% of its exports and implied that 
the GOT was quite vulnerable, should Europe ever decide to 
impose some form of political conditionality on access to the 
EU market. 
 
20.(U) This cable has been cleared by DAS Carpenter. 
MANZANARES