US embassy cable - 05SANTODOMINGO1562

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 SANTO DOMINGO 001562 
 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR WHA, WHA/CAR, WHA/OAS, S/CT; 
USCINCSO ALSO FOR POLAD; 
DHS FOR CIS-CARLOS ITURREGUI 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/17/2015 
TAGS: PGOV, PREL, PTER, DR 
SUBJECT: DOMINICAN PRESIDENT FERNANDEZ STRESSES DANGER OF 
INTERNATIONAL TERRORISM 
 
Classified By: DCM Lisa Kubiske.  Reason:  1.4 (b) and (d). 
 
1.  (U)  Dominican President Leonel Fernandez was host and 
keynote speaker for a high-level discussion of "The World 
After Terrorism" on March 14-15.  This 12th periodic Plenary 
Seminar of the Circle of Montevideo, an informal gathering of 
Latin American former heads of state, was held at 
Fernandez,s Global Foundation for Democracy and Development 
(FUNGLODE) in Santo Domingo.   In his keynote speech 
Fernandez expressed great concern over the vulnerability of 
the Dominican Republic to terrorism as the "new paradigm of 
foreign relations." 
 
2.  (U)  Participants included Nobel Prize winner Oscar Arias 
of Costa Rica, Julio Maria Sanguinetti of Uruguay, Belisario 
Betancur of Colombia, and Fernando Henrique Cardoso of 
Brasil. President of the Inter-American Development Bank 
(IDB), Enrique Iglesias, was also present. 
 
3.  (U)  In opening remarks Fernandez said that the issue of 
security was closely identified with globalization.  The 
Dominican people, also, were victims to the September 11 
attacks and their aftermath.  Dominicans died both in World 
Trade Towers and in the March 11 attack on Atocha Station in 
Madrid in 2004.  The abrupt downturn in the Dominican economy 
in 2002 was due in large part to terrorism,s effects on 
world tourism; Dominicans were part of the "collateral 
damage" of those attacks. 
 
4.  (U)  Many Dominicans do not understand their 
vulnerability to terror, Fernandez said. "In our country, 
traditionally we have lacked the awareness and consciousness 
of the effects of these international problems on our own 
national development."   Dominicans are focused on immediate 
national problems such as electricity shortages or the 
conditions of Dominican prisons.  "This lack of historic 
awareness does not correspond with our reality. . .if we 
think of ourselves in the historic framework, we see that the 
world beyond the Dominican Republic has always played a 
special role for us."  He cited the decisive role of the 
Organization of American States in undermining Trujillo,s 
dictatorship and the United States intervention in 1965. 
 
5.  (U)  Fernandez emphasized the "great significance" of 
bringing high-level visitors to Santo Domingo for the 
discussion "so as to raise the people,s awareness of the 
historic truth that no one can remain disengaged from this 
great struggle, which affects all of mankind and involves the 
Dominican Republic, as well." 
 
6.  (U)  The March 14 sessions were behind closed doors.  The 
conclusions presented on March 15 were general in nature, 
focused principally on measures to improve social conditions 
and to foster economic growth. 
 
7.  (SBU)  The President did the country a service by 
reminding complacent Dominicans that terrorism is equally 
capable of striking here.  As often happens with these 
seminars, that clear message was somewhat dissipated in the 
public rhetoric of the various participants, who tended to 
pontificate about social themes and complaints of 
underdevelopment.  Nobel Prize winner Oscar Arias went so far 
as to maintain that the United States had been looking for an 
enemy since the fall of the Berlin Wall "and on September 11, 
the United States found one."  In a quiet moment later in the 
day the Ambassador took Arias aside and reminded him that the 
Al-Qaeda militants had been the ones looking for an enemy on 
September 11. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
8.  (C)  Once again Fernandez delivers the right message on 
an important topic.  He has not yet been as forceful in 
practice.  This happened before, regarding the tractations in 
late 2004 on the free trade agreement.  As for crime, the 
Dominicans provide rapid, exemplary law enforcement and 
intelligence cooperation whenever the United States furnishes 
specific detail about an international threat; but they 
remain sluggish and timorous about cleaning up the corruption 
and malfeasance within their own system.  The vigor and 
principle of Attorney General Dominguez Brito is offset by 
too much hesitation within the ranks of the uniformed 
security services about firing those known to be indulgent of 
corruption or even deeply engaged in it. 
 
9.  (U)The full text in Spanish of Fernandez,s remarks is 
posted on our SIPRNET site, 
www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/santodomingo. 
HERTELL