The End Of Secrecy_ The Rise And Fall Of WikiLeaks Part 12

A WEDDING FEAST, THE CAUCASUS WAY.

Thursday, 31 August 2006, 06:39 CONFIDENTIAL SECTION 01 OF 05 MOSCOW 009533.

SIPDIS.

SIPDIS.

EO 12958 DECL: 08/30/2016.

TAGS PGOV, ECON, PINR, RS">RS SUBJECT: A CAUCASUS WEDDING.

Cla.s.sified By: Deputy Chief of Mission Daniel A. Russell. Reason 1.4 (b, d) Summary

1. (C) Weddings are elaborate in Dagestan, the largest autonomy in the North Caucasus. On August 22 we attended a wedding in Makhachkala, Dagestan's capital: Duma member and Dagestan Oil Company chief Gadzhi Makhachev's son married a cla.s.smate. The lavish display and heavy drinking concealed the deadly serious North Caucasus politics of land, ethnicity, clan, and alliance. The guest list spanned the Caucasus power structure guest starring Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov and underlined just how personal the region's politics can be. End Summary.

2. (C) Dagestani weddings are serious business: a forum for showing respect, fealty and alliance among families; the bride and groom themselves are little more than showpieces. Weddings take place in discrete parts over three days. On the first day the groom's family and the bride's family simultaneously hold separate receptions. During the receptions the groom leads a delegation to the bride's reception and escorts her back to his own reception, at which point she formally becomes a member of the groom's family, forsaking her old family and clan. The next day, the groom's parents hold another reception, this time for the bride's family and friends, who can "inspect" the family they have given their daughter to. On the third day, the bride's family holds a reception for the groom's parents and family.

Father of the Groom

3. (C) On August 22, Gadzhi Makhachev married off his 19 year-old son Dalgat to Aida Sharipova. The wedding in Makhachkala, which we attended, was a microcosm of the social and political relations of the North Caucasus, beginning with Gadzhi's own biography. Gadzhi started off as an Avar clan leader. Enver Kisriyev, the leading scholar of Dagestani society, told us that as Soviet power receded from Dagestan in the late 1980s, the complex society fell back to its pre-Russian structure. The basic structural unit is the monoethnic "jamaat," in this usage best translated as "canton" or "commune." The ethnic groups themselves are a Russian construct: faced with hundreds of jamaats, the 19th century Russian conquerors lumped cantons speaking related dialects together and called them "Avar," "Dargin," etc. to reduce the number of "nationalities" in Dagestan to 38. Ever since then, jamaats within each ethnic group have been competing with one another to lead the ethnic group. This compet.i.tion is especially marked among the Avars, the largest nationality in Dagestan.

4. (C) As Russian power faded, each canton fielded a militia to defend its people both in the mountains and the capital Makhachkala. Gadzhi became the leader from his home canton of Burtunay, in Kazbek Rayon. He later a.s.serted pan-Avar ambitions, founding the Imam Shamil Popular Front named after the great Avar leader of mountaineer resistance to the Russians to promote the interests of the Avars and of Burtunay's role within the ethnic group. Among his exploits was a role in the military defense of Dagestan against the 1999 invasion from Chechnya by Shamil Basayev and al-Khattab, and his political defense of Avar villages under pressure in Chechnya, Georgia and Azerbaijan.

5. (C) Gadzhi has cashed in the social capital he made from nationalism, translating it into financial and political capital as head of Dagestan's state oil company and as the single-mandate representative for Makhachkala in Russia's State Duma. His dealings in the oil business including close cooperation with U.S. firms have left him well off enough to afford luxurious houses in Makhachkala, Kaspiysk, Moscow, Paris and San Diego; and a large collection of luxury automobiles, including the Rolls Royce Silver Phantom in which Dalgat fetched Aida from her parents' reception. (Gadzhi gave us a lift in the Rolls once in Moscow, but the legroom was somewhat constricted by the presence of a Kalashnikov carbine at our feet. Gadzhi has survived numerous a.s.sa.s.sination attempts, as have most of the still-living leaders of Dagestan. In Dagestan he always travels in an armored BMW with one, sometimes two follow cars full of uniformed armed guards.) 6. (C) Gadzhi has gone beyond his Avar base, pursuing a multi-ethnic cadre policy to develop a network of loyalists. He has sent Dagestani youths, including his sons, to a military type high school near San Diego (we met one graduate, a Jewish boy from Derbent now studying at San Diego state. He has no plans to enter the Russian military).

MOSCOW 00009533 002 OF 005.

Gadzhi's multi-ethnic reach ill.u.s.trates what the editor of the Dagestani paper "Chernovik" told us: that in the last few years the development of inter-ethnic business clans has eroded traditional jamaat loyalties.

7. (C) But the Avar symbolism is still strong. Gadzhi's brother, an artist from St. Petersburg, ordered as a wedding gift a life-sized statue of Imam Shamil. Shamil is the iconic national symbol, despite his stern and inflexible character (portrayed in Tolstoy's "Hadji-Murat" as the mountaineers' tyrannical counterpart to the absolutist Tsar). Connection with Shamil makes for n.o.bility among Avars today. Gadzhi often mentions that he is a descendant on his mother's side of Gair-Bek, one of Shamil's deputies.

The Day Before

8. (C) Gadzhi's Kaspiysk summer house is an enormous structure on the sh.o.r.e of the Caspian, essentially a huge circular reception room much like a large restaurant attached to a 40-meter high green airport tower on columns, accessible only by elevator, with a couple of bedrooms, a reception room, and a grotto whose gla.s.s floor was the roof of a huge fish tank. The heavily guarded compound also boasts a second house, outbuildings, a tennis court, and two piers out into the Caspian, one rigged with block and tackle for launching jet skis. The house filled up with visitors from all over the Caucasus during the afternoon of August 21. The Chair of Ingushetia's parliament drove in with two colleagues; visitors from Moscow included politicians, businessmen and an Avar football coach. Many of the visitors grew up with Gadzhi in Khasavyurt, including an Ingush Olympic wrestler named Vakha who seemed to be perpetually tipsy. Another group of Gadzhi's boyhood friends from Khasavyurt was led by a man who looked like Shamil Basayev on his day off flip-flops, t-s.h.i.+rt, baseball cap, beard but turned out to be the chief rabbi of Stavropol Kray. He told us he has 12,000 co-religionists in the province, 8,000 of them in its capital, Pyatigorsk. 70 percent are, like him, Persian-speaking Mountain Jews; the rest are a mixture of Europeans, Georgians and Bukharans.

9. (C) Also present was Chechnya's Duma member, Khalid (aka Ruslan) Yamadayev, brother of the commander of the notorious Vostok Battalion. He was reserved at the time, but in a follow-up conversation in Moscow on August 29 (please protect) he complained that Chechnya, lacking experts to develop programs for economic recovery, is simply demanding and disposing of cash from the central government. When we pressed him on disappearances, he admitted some took place, but claimed that often parents alleged their children had been abducted when in fact their sons had run off to join the fighters or in a case the week before they had murdered their daughter in an honor killing. We mentioned the abduction of a widow of Basayev, allegedly to gain access to his money. Khalid said he had not heard of the case, but knew that Basayev had had no interest in wealth; he may have been a religious fanatic, but he was a "normal" person. The fighters who remain are not a serious military force, in Khalid's view, and many would surrender under the proper terms and immunities. He himself is arranging the immunity of a senior official of the Maskhadov era, whose name he would not reveal.

10. (C) During lunch, Gadzhi took a congratulatory call from Dagestan's president, Mukhu Aliyev. Gadzhi told Aliyev how honored he would be if Aliyev could drop in at the wedding reception. There was a degree of tension in the conversation, which was between two figures each implicitly claiming the mantle of leaders.h.i.+p of the Avars. In the event, Aliyev snubbed Gadzhi and did not show up for the wedding, though the rest of Dagestan's political leaders.h.i.+p did.

11. (C) Though Gadzhi's house was not the venue for the main wedding reception, he ensured that all his guests were constantly plied with food and drink. The cooks seemed to keep whole sheep and whole cows boiling in a cauldron somewhere day and night, dumping disjointed fragments of the carca.s.s on the tables whenever someone entered the room. Gadzhi's two chefs kept a wide variety of unusual dishes in circulation (in addition to the omnipresent boiled meat and fatty bouillon). The alcohol consumption before, during and after this Muslim wedding was stupendous. Amidst an alcohol shortage, Gadzhi had flown in from the Urals thousands of bottles of Beluga Export vodka ("Best consumed with caviar"). There was also entertainment, beginning even that day, with the big-name performers appearing both at the wedding hall and at Gadzhi's summer house. Gadzhi's main act, a Syrian-born singer named Avraam Russo, could not make it because he was shot a few days before the wedding, but there The alcohol consumption before, during and after this Muslim wedding was stupendous. Amidst an alcohol shortage, Gadzhi had flown in from the Urals thousands of bottles of Beluga Export vodka ("Best consumed with caviar"). There was also entertainment, beginning even that day, with the big-name performers appearing both at the wedding hall and at Gadzhi's summer house. Gadzhi's main act, a Syrian-born singer named Avraam Russo, could not make it because he was shot a few days before the wedding, but there MOSCOW 00009533 003 OF 005.

was a "gypsy" troupe from St. Petersburg, a couple of Azeri pop stars, and from Moscow, Benya the Accordion King with his family of singers. A host of local bands, singing in Avar and Dargin, rounded out the entertainment, which was constant and extremely amplified.

10. (C) The main activity of the day was eating and drinking starting from 4 p.m., about eight hours worth, all told punctuated, when all were laden with food and sodden with drink, with a bout of jet skiing in the Caspian. After dinner, though, the first band started an informal performance drums, accordion and clarinet playing the lezginka, the universal dance of the Caucasus. To the uninitiated Westerner, the music sounds like an undifferentiated wall of sound. This was a signal for dancing: one by one, each of the dramatically paunchy men (there were no women present) would enter the arena and exhibit his personal lezginka for the limit of his duration, usually 30 seconds to a minute. Each ethnic group's lezginka was different the Dagestani lezginka the most energetic, the Chechen the most aggressive and belligerent, and the Ingush smoother.

Wedding Day 1

11. (C) An hour before the wedding reception was set to begin the "Marrakech" reception hall was full of guests men taking the air outside and women already filling a number of the tables inside, older ones with headscarves chaperoning dozens of teenaged girls. A Dagestani parliamentarian explained that weddings are a princ.i.p.al venue for teenagers and more importantly their parents to get a look at one another with a view to future matches. Security was tight police presence on the ground plus police snipers positioned on the roof of an overlooking apartment block. Gadzhi even a.s.signed one of his guards as our personal bodyguard inside the reception. The manager told Gadzhi there were seats for over a thousand guests at a time. At the height of the reception, it was standing room only.

12. (C) At precisely two p.m. the male guests started filing in. They varied from pols and oligarchs of all sorts the slick to the Jura.s.sic; wizened brown peasants from Burtunay; and Dagestan's sports and cultural celebrities. Khalid Yamadayev presided over a political table in the smaller of the two halls (the music was in the other) along with Vakha the drunken wrestler, the Ingush parliamentarians, a member of the Federation Council who is also a nanophysicist and has lectured in Silicon Valley, and Gadzhi's cousin Ismail Alibekov, a submariner first rank naval captain now serving at the General Staff in Moscow. The Dagestani milieu appears to be one in which the highly educated and the gun-toting can mix easily often in the same person.

13. (C) After a couple of hours Dalgat's convoy returned with Aida, horns honking. Dalgat and Aida got out of the Rolls and were serenaded into the hall, and into the Makhachev family, by a boys' chorus lining both sides of the red carpet, dressed in costumes aping medieval Dagestani armor with little s.h.i.+elds and swords. The couple's entry was the signal for the emcee to roll into high gear, and after a few toasts the Piter "gypsies" began their performance. (The next day one of Gadzhi's houseguests sneered, "Some gypsies! The bandleader was certainly Jewish, and the rest of them were blonde." There was some truth to this, but at least the two dancing girls appeared to be Roma.) 14. (C) As the bands played, the marriageable girls came out to dance the lezginka in what looked like a slowly revolving conga line while the boys sat together at tables staring intently. The boys were all in white s.h.i.+rts and black slacks, while the girls wore a wide variety of multicolored but fas.h.i.+onable c.o.c.ktail dresses. Every so often someone would shower the dancers with money there were some thousand ruble notes but the currency of choice was the U.S. hundred dollar bill. The floor was covered with them; young children would scoop the money up to distribute among the dancers.

15. (C) Gadzhi was locked into his role as host. He greeted every guest personally as they entered the hall failure to do so would cause great insult and later moved constantly from table to table drinking toasts with everyone. The 120 toasts he estimated he drank would have killed anyone, hardened drinker or not, but Gadzhi had his Afghan waiter Khan following him around to pour his drinks from a special vodka bottle containing water. Still, he was much the worse for wear by evening's end. At one point we caught up with him dancing with two scantily clad Russian women who looked far from home. One, it turned out was a Moscow poet (later she recited an incomprehensible poem in Gadzhi's honor) who MOSCOW 00009533 004 OF 005.

was in town with a film director to write the screenplay for a film immortalizing Gadzhi's defense of Dagestan against Shamil Basayev. By 6 p.m. most of the houseguests had returned to Gadzhi's seaside home for more swimming and more jet-skiing-under-the-influence. But by 8 the summer house's restaurant was full once more, the food and drink were flowing, the name performers were giving acoustic renditions of the songs they had sung at the reception, and some stupendously fat guests were displaying their lezginkas for the benefit of the two visiting Russian women, who had wandered over from the reception.

The Wedding Day 2: Enter The Man

16. (C) The next day's reception at the Marrakech was Gadzhi's tribute to Aida's family, after which we all returned to a dinner at Gadzhi's summer home. Most of the tables were set with the usual dishes plus whole roast sturgeons and sheep. But at 8:00 p.m. the compound was invaded by dozens of heavily armed mujahedin for the grand entrance of Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, dressed in jeans and a t-s.h.i.+rt, looking shorter and less muscular than in his photos, and with a somewhat c.o.c.k-eyed expression on his face. After greetings from Gadzhi, Ramzan and about 20 of his retinue sat around the tables eating and listening to Benya the Accordion King. Gadzhi then announced a fireworks display in honor of the birthday of Ramzan's late father, Ahmat-Hadji Kadyrov. The fireworks started with a bang that made both Gadzhi and Ramzan flinch. Gadzhi had from the beginning requested that none of his guests, most of whom carried sidearms, fire their weapons in celebration. Throughout the wedding they complied, not even joining in the magnificent fireworks display.

17. (C) After the fireworks, the musicians struck up the lezginka in the courtyard and a group of two girls and three boys one no more than six years old performed gymnastic versions of the dance. First Gadzhi joined them and then Ramzan, who danced clumsily with his gold-plated automatic stuck down in the back of his jeans (a houseguest later pointed out that the gold housing eliminated any practical use of the gun, but smirked that Ramzan probably couldn't fire it anyway). Both Gadzhi and Ramzan showered the dancing children with hundred dollar bills; the dancers probably picked upwards of USD 5000 off the cobblestones. Gadzhi told us later that Ramzan had brought the happy couple "a five kilo lump of gold" as his wedding present. After the dancing and a quick tour of the premises, Ramzan and his army drove off back to Chechnya. We asked why Ramzan did not spend the night in Makhachkala, and were told, "Ramzan never spends the night anywhere."

18. (C) After Ramzan sped off, the dinner and drinking especially the latter continued. An Avar FSB colonel sitting next to us, dead drunk, was highly insulted that we would not allow him to add "cognac" to our wine. "It's practically the same thing," he insisted, until a Russian FSB general sitting opposite told him to drop it. We were inclined to cut the Colonel some slack, though: he is head of the unit to combat terrorism in Dagestan, and Gadzhi told us that extremists have sooner or later a.s.sa.s.sinated everyone who has joined that unit. We were more worried when an Afghan war buddy of the Colonel's, Rector of the Dagestan University Law School and too drunk to sit, let alone stand, pulled out his automatic and asked if we needed any protection. At this point Gadzhi and his people came over, propped the rector between their shoulders, and let us get out of range.

Postscript: The Practical Uses of a Caucasus Wedding

19. (C) Kadyrov's attendance was a mark of respect and alliance, the result of Gadzhi's careful cultivation dating back to personal friends.h.i.+p with Ramzan's father. This is a necessary political tool in a region where difficulties can only be resolved by using personal relations.h.i.+ps to reach ad hoc informal agreements. An example was readily to hand: on August 22 Chechnya's parliamentary speaker, Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, gave an interview in which he made specific territorial claims to the Kizlyar, Khasavyurt and Novolak regions of Dagestan. The first two have significant Chechen-Akkin populations, and the last was part of Chechnya until the 1944 deportation, when Stalin forcibly resettled ethnic Laks (a Dagestani nationality) there. Gadzhi said he would have to answer Abdurakhmanov and work closely with Ramzan to reduce the tensions "that fool" had caused. Asked why he took such statements seriously, he told us that in the Caucasus all disputes revolve around land, and such claims can never be MOSCOW 00009533 005 OF 005.

dismissed. Unresolved land claims are the "threads" the Russian center always kept in play to pull when needed. We asked why these claims are coming out now, and were told it was euphoria, pure and simple. After all they had received, the Chechen leaders.h.i.+p's feet are miles off the ground. (A well-connected Chechen contact later told us he thought that raising nationalistic irredentism was part of Abdurakhmanov's effort to gain a political base independent from Kadyrov.) 20. (C) The "horizontal of power" represented by Gadzhi's relations.h.i.+p with Ramzan is the ant.i.thesis of the Moscow-imposed "vertical of power." Gadzhi's business partner Khalik Gindiyev, head of Rosneft-Kaspoil, complained that Moscow should let local Caucasians rather than Russians "Magomadovs and Aliyevs, not Ivanovs and Petrovs" resolve the region's conflicts. The vertical of power, he said, is inapplicable to the Caucasus, a region that Moscow bureaucrats such as PolPred Kozak would never understand. The Caucasus needs to be given the scope to resolve its own problems. But this was not a plug for democracy. Gadzhi told us democracy would always fail in the Caucasus, where the conception of the state is as an extension of the Caucasus family, in which the father's word is law. "Where is the room for democracy in that?" he asked. We paraphrased Hayek: if you run a family as you do a state, you destroy the family. Running a state as you do a family destroys the state: ties of kins.h.i.+p and friends.h.i.+p will always trump the rule of law. Gadzhi's partner agreed, shaking his head sadly. "That's a matter for generations to come," he said.

BURNS.

PRINCE ANDREW RAILS AGAINST.

FRANCE, THE SFO AND THE GUARDIAN.

Wednesday, 29 October 2008, 12:07 CONFIDENTIAL SECTION 01 OF 04 BISHKEK 001095.

CORRECTED COPY (ADDRESSEE).

Cla.s.sified By: Amb. Tatiana Gfoeller, Reason 1.4 (b) and (d).

1. (C) SUMMARY: On October 28, the Amba.s.sador partic.i.p.ated in a two-hour brunch to brief HRH the Duke of York ahead of his meetings with the Kyrgyz Prime Minister and other high-level officials. She was the only non-subject of the United Kingdom or the Commonwealth invited to partic.i.p.ate by the British Amba.s.sador to the Kyrgyz Republic. Other partic.i.p.ants included major British investors in Kyrgyzstan and the Canadian operator of the k.u.mtor mine. The discussion covered the investment climate for Western firms in the Kyrgyz Republic, the problem of corruption, the revival of the "Great Game," Russian and Chinese influence in the country, and the Prince's personal views on promoting British economic interests. Astonis.h.i.+ngly candid, the discussion at times verged on the rude (from the British side). END SUMMARY.

2. (C) British Amba.s.sador to the Kyrgyz Republic Paul Brummell invited the Amba.s.sador to partic.i.p.ate in briefing His Royal Highness Prince Andrew, the Duke of York, ahead of his October 28 meetings with Kyrgyz Prime Minister Igor Chudinov and other high-level officials. The Prince was in Kyrgyzstan to promote British economic interests. Originally scheduled to last an hour over brunch, the briefing ended up lasting two hours, thanks to the super-engaged Prince's pointed questions. The Amba.s.sador was the only partic.i.p.ant who was not a British subject or linked to the Commonwealth. The absence of her French and German colleagues was notable; they were apparently not invited despite being fellow members of the European Union. Others included major British investors in Kyrgyzstan and the Canadian operator of the k.u.mtor mine.

"YOU HAVE TO TAKE THE ROUGH WITH THE SMOOTH"

3. (C) The discussion was kicked off by the president of the Canadian-run k.u.mtor mine, who described at length his company's travails of trying to negotiate a revised mining concession that provides a greater stake in k.u.mtor's parent company to the Kyrgyz government in exchange for a simplified tax regime and an expanded concession. He was followed by the representative of the British owner of Kyrgyzneftigas, who explained his company's role in Kyrgyz oil exploration and production, as well as doing his share of complaining of being hara.s.sed and hounded by Kyrgyz tax authorities. One example he gave was that a Kyrgyz shareholder was now suing the company, saying that his "human rights" were being violated by the terms of his shareholders' agreement.

4. (C) The Prince reacted with unmitigated patriotic fervor. To his credit, he diligently tried to understand the Kyrgyz point view. However, when partic.i.p.ants explained that some Kyrgyz feel that they were "unfairly" led in the 1990s to sign unfavorable contracts with Westerners, he evinced no sympathy. "A contract is a contract," he insisted. "You have to take the rough with the smooth."

"ALL OF THIS SOUNDS EXACTLY LIKE FRANCE"

5. (C) After having half-heartedly danced around the topic for a bit, only mentioning "personal interests" in pointed fas.h.i.+on, the business representatives then plunged into describing what they see as the appallingly high state of corruption in the Kyrgyz economy. While claiming that all of them never partic.i.p.ated in it and never gave out bribes, one representative of a middle-sized company stated that "It is sometimes an awful temptation." In an astonis.h.i.+ng display of candor in a public hotel where the brunch was taking place, all of the businessmen then chorused that nothing gets done in Kyrgyzstan if x.x.xx.x.xx.x.xx.x.x does not get "his cut." Prince Andrew took up the topic with gusto, saying that he keeps hearing x.x.xx.x.xx.x.xx.x.x name "over and over again" whenever he discusses doing business in this country. Emboldened, one businessman said that doing business here is "like doing business in the Yukon" in the nineteenth century, i.e. only those willing to partic.i.p.ate in local corrupt practices are able to make any money. His colleagues all heartily agreed, with one pointing out that "nothing ever changes here. Before all you heard was Akayev's son's name. Now it's x.x.xx.x.xx.x.xx.x.x name." At this point the Duke of York laughed uproariously, saying that: "All of this sounds exactly like France."

6. (C) The Prince then turned to the Amba.s.sador for an American take on the situation. The Amba.s.sador described American business interests in the country, which range from large investments such as the Hyatt hotel and the Katel telecommunications company to smaller investments in a range of sectors. She stated that part of the problem with business conditions in Kyrgyzstan was the rapid turnover in government positions. Some reacted to their short tenures in a corrupt manner, wanting to "steal while they can" until they were turned out of office. While noting the need for greater transparency in doing business, she recounted that she had hosted the American Chamber of Commerce's Members Day last week (attended by the Foreign Minister and the Deputy Minister of Trade and Commerce) which had been widely attended and a resounding success (see reftel). She then described the beneficial impact on the Kyrgyz economy of the Coalition Air Base at Manas Airport.

"YOU HAVE TO CURE YOURSELF OF ANOREXIA"

7. (C) With a mock groan, the Duke of York then exclaimed: "My G.o.d, what am I supposed to tell these people?!" More seriously, he invited his guests to suggest ways Kyrgyzstan's economic prospects and attractiveness could be improved. Everyone agreed that in his talks with the Prime Minister and others, he should emphasize the rule of law, and long-term stability.

8. (C) Agreeing with the Amba.s.sador's point about rapid government turnover, they urged him to impress upon his hosts the importance of predictability and the sanct.i.ty of contracts in order to attract more Western investment. At the same time, they pointed out that none of this was necessary to attract Russian, Kazakh, or Chinese investments. It appeared to them that the Kyrgyz were satisfied with their level and on the verge of "not bothering" with making the necessary improvements to attract Western investments. Returning to what is obviously a favorite theme, Prince Andrew cracked: "They won't need to make any changes to attract the French either!" Again turning thoughtful, the Prince mused that outsiders could do little to change the culture of corruption here. "They themselves have to have a change of heart. Just like you have to cure yourself of anorexia. No one else can do it for you."

PLAYING THE GREAT GAME (BY EXTENSION THE AMERICANS TOO).

9. (C) Addressing the Amba.s.sador directly, Prince Andrew then turned to regional politics. He stated baldly that "the United Kingdom, Western Europe (and by extension you Americans too)" were now back in the thick of playing the Great Game. More animated than ever, he stated c.o.c.kily: "And this time we aim to win!" Without contradicting him, the Amba.s.sador gently reminded him that the United States does not see its presence in the region as a continuation of the Great Game. We support Kyrgyzstan's independence and sovereignty but also welcome good relations between it and all of its neighbors, including Russia.

10. (C) The Prince pounced at the sound of that name. He told the Amba.s.sador that he was a frequent visitor to Central Asia and the Caucasus and had noticed a marked increase in Russian pressure and concomitant anxiety among the locals post-August events in Georgia. He stated the following story related to him recently by Azerbaijan's President Aliyev. Aliyev had received a letter from President Medvedev telling him that if Azerbaijan supported the designation of the Bolshevik artificial famine in Ukraine as "genocide" at the United Nations, "then you can forget about seeing Nagorno-Karabakh ever again." Prince Andrew added that every single other regional President had told him of receiving similar "directive" letters from Medvedev except for Bakiyev. He asked the Amba.s.sador if Bakiyev had received something similar as well. The Amba.s.sador answered that she was not aware of any such letter.

11. (C) The Duke then stated that he was very worried about Russia's resurgence in the region. As an example, he cited the recent Central Asian energy and water-sharing deal (septel), which he claimed to know had been "engineered by Russia, who finally pounded her fist on the table and everyone fell into line." (NOTE: Interestingly, the Turkish Amba.s.sador to the Kyrgyz Republic recently described her a.n.a.lysis of the deal to the Amba.s.sador in strikingly similar language. END NOTE.) 12. (C) Showing that he is an equal-opportunity Great Game player, HRH then turned to the topic of China. He recounted that when he had recently asked the President of Tajikistan what he thought of growing Chinese influence in Central Asia, the President had responded "with language I won't use in front of ladies." His interlocutors told the Prince that while Russians are generally viewed sympathetically throughout the region, the Chinese are not. He nodded, terming Chinese economic and possibly other expansion in the region "probably inevitable, but a menace."

RUDE LANGUAGE A LA BRITISH.

13. (C) The brunch had already lasted almost twice its allotted time, but the Prince looked like he was just getting started. Having exhausted the topic of Kyrgyzstan, he turned to the general issue of promoting British economic interests abroad. He railed at British anti-corruption investigators, who had had the "idiocy" of almost scuttling the Al-Yamama deal with Saudi Arabia. (NOTE: The Duke was referencing an investigation, subsequently closed, into alleged kickbacks a senior Saudi royal had received in exchange for the multi-year, lucrative BAE Systems contract to provide equipment and training to Saudi security forces. END NOTE.) His mother's subjects seated around the table roared their approval. He then went on to "these (expletive) journalists, especially from the National Guardian, who poke their noses everywhere" and (presumably) make it harder for British businessmen to do business. The crowd practically clapped. Having exhausted the topic of Kyrgyzstan, he turned to the general issue of promoting British economic interests abroad. He railed at British anti-corruption investigators, who had had the "idiocy" of almost scuttling the Al-Yamama deal with Saudi Arabia. (NOTE: The Duke was referencing an investigation, subsequently closed, into alleged kickbacks a senior Saudi royal had received in exchange for the multi-year, lucrative BAE Systems contract to provide equipment and training to Saudi security forces. END NOTE.) His mother's subjects seated around the table roared their approval. He then went on to "these (expletive) journalists, especially from the National Guardian, who poke their noses everywhere" and (presumably) make it harder for British businessmen to do business. The crowd practically clapped. He then capped this off with a zinger: castigating "our stupid (sic) British and American governments which plan at best for ten years whereas people in this part of the world plan for centuries." There were calls of "hear, hear" in the private brunch hall. Unfortunately for the a.s.sembled British subjects, their cherished Prince was now late to the Prime Minister's. He regretfully tore himself away from them and they from him. On the way out, one of them confided to the Amba.s.sador: "What a wonderful representative for the British people! We could not be prouder of our royal family!" He then capped this off with a zinger: castigating "our stupid (sic) British and American governments which plan at best for ten years whereas people in this part of the world plan for centuries." There were calls of "hear, hear" in the private brunch hall. Unfortunately for the a.s.sembled British subjects, their cherished Prince was now late to the Prime Minister's. He regretfully tore himself away from them and they from him. On the way out, one of them confided to the Amba.s.sador: "What a wonderful representative for the British people! We could not be prouder of our royal family!"

COMMENT.

14. (C) COMMENT: Prince Andrew reached out to the Amba.s.sador with cordiality and respect, evidently valuing her insights. However, he reacted with almost neuralgic patriotism whenever any comparison between the United States and United Kingdom came up. For example, one British businessman noted that despite the "overwhelming might of the American economy compared to ours" the amount of American and British investment in Kyrgyzstan was similar. Snapped the Duke: "No surprise there. The Americans don't understand geography. Never have. In the U.K., we have the best geography teachers in the world!" END COMMENT. GFOELLER

MERVYN KING EXPRESSES DOUBT.

OVER DAVID CAMERON AND.

GEORGE OSBORNE.

Article history 2010-02-17 EMBa.s.sY LONDON CONFIDENTIAL/NOFORN.

SUBJECT: BANK OF ENGLAND GOVERNOR: CONCERN ABOUT RECOVERY,.

Cla.s.sified By: Amba.s.sador Louis B. Susman 1. (C/NF) Summary. Reining in the UK's debt will be the greatest challenge facing the party that wins the expected May 6 general election, Bank of England Governor Mervyn King told the Amba.s.sador in a February 16 meeting. While neither party has adequately detailed plans to reduce the deficit, King expressed great concern about Conservative leaders' lack of experience and opined that Party leader David Cameron and Shadow Chancellor George Osborne have not fully grasped the pressures they will face from different groups when attempting to cut spending. King expressed great concern about Conservative leaders' lack of experience and opined that Party leader David Cameron and Shadow Chancellor George Osborne have not fully grasped the pressures they will face from different groups when attempting to cut spending. King also raised concerns about the global economic recovery, arguing that global growth in 2010 would be anaemic and a double-dip recession remained a possibility. Greece's profound economic troubles will trigger a further consolidation in power within the euro-zone, with Germany and France likely to impose the right to scrutinize if not exercise some control over Greek government accounts in return for an implicit or explicit guarantee, he predicted. The UK has been on the sidelines in the debate over Greece and could have less influence in the EU, as Germany and France will seek greater political cohesion in the euro-zone in the aftermath of the Greek crisis, he stated. King also raised concerns about the global economic recovery, arguing that global growth in 2010 would be anaemic and a double-dip recession remained a possibility. Greece's profound economic troubles will trigger a further consolidation in power within the euro-zone, with Germany and France likely to impose the right to scrutinize if not exercise some control over Greek government accounts in return for an implicit or explicit guarantee, he predicted. The UK has been on the sidelines in the debate over Greece and could have less influence in the EU, as Germany and France will seek greater political cohesion in the euro-zone in the aftermath of the Greek crisis, he stated.

Bleak UK and Global Economic Picture