Cablegate: Osce Permanent Council: Response to Head of The

VZCZCXYZ0889
RR RUEHWEB

DE RUEHC #2554 0651552
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 051548Z MAR 08
FM SECSTATE WASHDC
TO RUEHVEN/USMISSION USOSCE 8388
INFO ORG FOR SECURITY CO OP IN EUR COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS STATE 022554

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PHUM PREL OSCE HR
SUBJECT: OSCE PERMANENT COUNCIL: RESPONSE TO HEAD OF THE
OSCE OFFICE IN ZAGREB AMBASSADOR FUENTES

Post is authorized to present the following statement at the
March 6 Permanent Council meeting in Vienna.

Begin text:

Mr. Chairman,

We would like to welcome Ambassador Fuentes to the Permanent
Council for the first time in his new capacity as Head of the
OSCE Office in Zagreb.

We thank Ambassador Fuentes for his detailed report. As the
report points out, Croatia,s progress in implementing
several areas of the previous mandate allowed us to close the
Mission and open the Office with a very limited new mandate.

The United States hopes that the tasks of this new mandate
will be completed by the end of this year and that the Office
will therefore be able to conclude its work.

For that to happen, the Office must focus its activities
clearly on the two points in its mandate: monitoring war
crimes cases and reporting on residual aspects of the
implementation of the housing care program.

We note in this respect that the last two fortnightly reports
contain items not related to the mandate ) the gender
equality law and the election process. While we do
understand the desire to track outcomes from previous work,
we would like to see a focus on reporting on specific items
in the Office,s mandate.

We commend the Office for the fine work it is continuing to
do on monitoring war crimes cases. We would also encourage
the Office to focus on providing more training for Croatian
civil society, in order to build capacity for domestic
monitoring after the Office closes.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

End Text.
RICE

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