US embassy cable - 05CAIRO2693

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 03 CAIRO 002693 
 
SIPDIS 
 
NOFORN 
 
FOR NEA FRONT OFFICE 
ALSO FOR NEA/ELA, NEA/RA, S/CT, CA, DS, AND INL 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 04/06/2030 
TAGS: PTER, PREL, ASEC, KFRD, EG 
SUBJECT: EGYPT AND THE FIGHT AGAINST TERRORISM 
 
REF: A. STATE 60749 
     B. CAIRO 2596 
     C. CAIRO 2357 
 
Classified by Charge Gordon Gray for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d). 
 
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Introduction 
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1. (S/NF) Egypt brings to the fight against terrorism both 
its own grim experience and a track record of results.  In 
the 1990s, Egypt successfully subdued domestic terror groups 
that conducted operations ranging from firebombing video 
stores to attempted assassinations of senior GOE officials, 
to the massacre of foreign tourists.  The long period of calm 
that had prevailed since 1997 was interrupted on October 7, 
2004, when attacks targeting Israeli tourists in the Sinai 
left 34 dead.  These attacks were a clear reminder that the 
threat of terror remains, as does the need for constant 
vigilance.  U.S.-Egyptian cooperation on terrorism is 
excellent and constitutes one of the pillars of our strategic 
relationship.  While we are encouraged by our cooperation 
with the GOE, there is no question that Egypt faces serious 
challenges, particularly in the area of underlying conditions 
that can breed extremism.  Reinvigorating the U.S.-Egypt 
Counterterrorism Joint Working Group and reopening 
negotiations with the GOE on a Letter of Agreement that would 
enhance the GOE's counterterrorism capabilities are two 
practical steps we could take in the near future. 
 
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Defeating Terrorists 
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2. (S/NF) Both the Egyptian General Intelligence Service 
(EGIS) and the Ministry of Interior's State Security 
Investigations Service (SSIS) conduct extensive surveillance 
and disruption operations against extremist groups in Egypt. 
The GOE vigorously prosecutes cases of terrorism, recently 
convicting an Egyptian national and (in absentia) an Iranian 
Revolutionary Guard operative, of conspiracy to plan and 
execute acts of terrorism in Egypt and elsewhere in the 
region (ref B).  While the methods of some Egyptian security 
services can be crude and overzealous, and often raise 
serious human rights concerns, it cannot be denied that the 
GOE has been generally successful in its war on terrorism, 
particularly in the past 15 years. 
 
3. (S/NF) While SSIS and EGIS are the senior partners is the 
GOE's counterterrorism infrastructure, Egypt has established 
an interagency National Counterrorism Committee charged with 
coordinating GOE counterterrorism policy and operations. 
This committee, composed of elements from the Ministry of 
Justice, the Public Prosecution, and the Ministry of Foreign 
Affairs (as well as SSIS and EGIS), received in January 
visiting USDOJ officials and accompanying Embassy 
representatives.  In the candid conversation that followed, 
the National Committee affirmed its interest in strengthening 
the application of the U.S.-Egypt Mutual Legal Assistance 
Treaty, exploring the possibility of a modern extradition 
treaty, and expanding training and technical cooperation. 
The Regional Representative of the UN's Office on Drugs and 
Crime recently briefed us on his work to establish in Cairo a 
regional organized crime training center (which would include 
a major counterterrorism component), and told us that he 
found the GOE's National Counterterrorism Committee to be 
serious, pragmatic, and flexible in pursuit of its mission. 
In our interactions with the GOE, we have welcomed this 
interdisciplinary approach and will continue to encourage it. 
 
4. (SBU) In addition to an ongoing and fruitful exchange of 
information and intelligence between the U.S. and Egypt on 
suspected terrorists and operations, the Department of 
State's Anti-Terrorism Assistance (ATA) program, implemented 
by the Bureau of Diplomatic Security has run a variety of 
successful training programs in Egypt and plans to do more. 
 
5. (SBU) In the past year, ATA funded a multi-day crisis 
management seminar in which 20 senior GOE security officials 
participated.  The seminar stressed principles of 
establishing policy and command structures for managing 
crises caused by terrorist provocation as well as crises 
caused by natural events that impact on national-level 
systems and/or have international ramifications.  In early 
2005, ATA funded a major maritime security training module in 
which a United States Coast Guard Mobile Training Team 
presented a two week course on various Maritime Security 
measures ranging from International law, ship boarding, 
smuggling trends, effective communications and use of force, 
defensive tactics, escorts and high risk searches.  The 24 
Egyptian participants came from a wide range of backgrounds, 
including narcotics, Port Security, State Security, Port 
Police, Environmental Police, Central Security and Special 
Operations. 
 
6. (SBU) In the coming year the Embassy plans to implement 
two more ATA funded programs:  The first course, a two week 
program focused on Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), will 
provide hands-on training, an academic refresher, and field 
exercises in simulated WMD emergencies.  The course will 
provide participants with the capability to execute 
fundamental hazardous material and emergency management 
response and procedures. In addition to the training course, 
there will be an equipment grant issued upon the conclusion 
of training. Participants will include police, fire, 
emergency medical technicians.  The second course planned for 
this year will concern Airport Security Management.  The 
Transportation Security Administration will give the Egyptian 
Airport security training in technical areas of National and 
Civil Aviation Security, Security Control Systems, and 
recommended aviation security issues.  The participants will 
include all elements of National and Civil Aviation Security 
as well as all liaison security to Aviation facilities.  In 
sume, the ATA program has been a success in enhancing CT 
capabilities in Egypt. 
 
7. (S/NF) Another important element in defending the homeland 
is the Embassy's own effort to ensure that terrorists do not 
exploit our travel document issuance processes.  The Embassy 
has maintained a high alert in both the visa and American 
Citizens Services sections.  In March 2005, we held a very 
successful seminar on detecting terrorists through visa 
interviews, described in ref C.  In addition, the Consular 
Section has a fraud investigator who is funded by DS, and who 
focuses on Consular Fraud issues.  This person, a seconded 
Egyptian police officer, is in a key position to ferret out 
fraud and to coordinate with the local authorities in 
investigating the syndicates and other organizations that 
proliferate the fraud.  A position for another FSN fraud 
investigator has been funded by CA and filled in the last 
year. 
 
8.  (SBU) Unfortunately, the Embassy does not have a 
full-time fraud prevention management (FPM) officer to 
oversee the unit.  The recent OIG team formally recommended 
that an FPM position be established.  The addition of the 
designated fraud officer will, besides bringing much-needed 
emphasis on fraud management, allow post to reduce its 
backlog and allow additional training on identifying 
mala-fide travelers.  We understand that Cairo is in line to 
receive such an officer in FY 2006. 
 
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Denying Sanctuary 
----------------- 
 
9. (S/NF) Unlike some states in the region, Egypt does not 
provide a safe-haven or hospitable base for regional or 
international terrorist or extremist groups.  Egypt 
periodically hosts representatives from violent and extremist 
Palestinian factions, but with the aim of persuading and 
pressuring these groups to abandon terrorism and submit to 
the Palestinian Authority. 
 
10. (S/NF) Egypt has set an example for the region in its 
efforts to combat money laundering.  Egypt has a strong 
assets-freezing regime, passed robust anti-money laundering 
legislation in 2002, and formed a fully functioning financial 
intelligence unit (FIU) in 2003.  However, Egypt is still in 
need of a neutral superintendent of banks.  Recent progress 
in modernizing and liberalizing Egypt's financial sector 
could make the country a more attractive money-laundering hub 
in the absence of continued vigilance.  Post believes a focus 
on cooperation with the FIU, and efforts to include terror 
financing considerations in GOE banking reform, would be a 
useful aspect of counterterrorism cooperation. 
 
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Diminishing Underlying Conditions 
--------------------------------- 
 
11. (C) Combating the conditions in which extremism can rise 
and flourish poses the most difficult challenge in Egypt. 
Economic growth has not kept pace with population growth, 
leading to chronic and widespread unemployment among Egypt's 
youth.  As amply documented by Egyptian and Arab social 
researchers, a decayed, overtaxed, and under-resourced 
educational system in Egypt has produced generations of youth 
lacking analytical and critical thinking skills.  Images of 
violence from Palestine and Iraq, amplified by biased and 
irresponsible local media, have had a radicalizing effect and 
have reinforced a tendency in Egyptian society to glorify 
"martyrs" among Palestinian extremist groups and even among 
the perpetrators of the insurgency in Iraq. 
12. (C) Though the GOE has at times shown an inexplicable 
ambivalence toward irresponsible and inflammatory media 
coverage of terrorist activity in Palestine and Iraq, it has, 
in other ways, taken on the challenge of battling extremist 
ideology at home.  In 2003, the GOE began tentatively 
releasing imprisoned members of the Islamic Group, the 
organization responsible for most of the acts of terror 
committed in the early-mid 1990s.  The releases came in the 
context of a reconciliation and recantation process in which 
the former Islamic Group leadership published new tracts, 
citing Islamic scripture and jurisprudence, to renounce 
violence and expose flaws in the religious logic they had 
previously used to justify terror. 
 
13. (S/NF) Similarly, the GOE has long been engaged in 
programs to monitor mosque activity and ensure that Imams 
(prayer leaders) installed by the Ministry of Religious 
Endowments do not themselves hold extremist views and are 
qualified and capable of defusing extremist theology that 
might be in circulation in local communities. 
 
14. (U) Our development programs play a critical role in 
addressing the broader underlying challenges in fighting 
terrorism.  Aggressive and ambitious programs targeting the 
various weaknesses in Egypt's education sector, and programs 
aimed at shoring up democratic institutions and practices, 
should make a significant impact, over the long haul, on the 
underlying conditions which breed extremism. 
 
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What More Can be Done 
--------------------- 
 
15. (SBU) The Embassy believes the February 2005 Riyadh 
declaration represents an important opportunity to shore up 
and expand international engagement on the GWOT. 
Coordination and cooperation by the states of the Middle East 
is particularly imperative and we stand ready to assist in 
this effort.  Egypt is perfectly placed to play a leading 
role.  Cairo has long been a hub of regional activity and the 
Arab League secretariat, and many other Arab regional 
organizations continue to make the city their home.  The USG 
should seriously weigh the many advantages of Cairo when 
considering venues for future regional Counterterrorism 
activities. 
 
16. (C) In July 2003, the U.S. and Egypt met in Washington to 
inaugurate a new Counter Terrorism Joint Working Group (JWG). 
 Both sides found the exchanges useful and strongly endorsed 
the continued use of the JWG as a forum for dialogue and 
cooperation.  Unfortunately, the follow-on JWG, which was to 
be held in Cairo in 2004, could not be scheduled.  We believe 
it imperative that this mechanism be reactivated and that a 
second U.S.-Egypt Counterterrorism JWG be scheduled as 
quickly as possible.  Besides enhancing our bilateral 
counterterrorism dialogue, the JWG also serves to reinforce 
the GOE's own inter-ministerial counterterrorism committee. 
 
17. (C) Although plans to complete with Egypt a $625,000 
Letter of Agreement were shelved in 2003 due to delays and 
reluctance on the Egyptian side, the Embassy believes it 
worthwhile to revive our efforts on this front.  Funds for 
the proposed LOA, which would have funded a border security 
initiative aimed at modernizing and augmenting security 
procedures at Egyptian ports of entry, were eventually 
reprogrammed by INL.  Tentative discussions with the Ministry 
of Interior suggest that the Egyptians may have some regrets 
that they did not take us up on our initial offer and would 
probably be more flexible in negotiating a new LOA.  If funds 
could be identified for a new LOA, we believe it could be 
negotiated and that U.S. benefits from a strengthened GOE 
counterterrorism capacity would more than compensate for the 
effort and resources applied. 
 
 
Visit Embassy Cairo's Classified Website: 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/cairo 
 
You can also access this site through the 
State Department's Classified SIPRNET website. 
 
GRAY