VZCZCXYZ0012
PP RUEHWEB
DE RUEHFR #0978 1431430
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 221430Z MAY 08
FM AMEMBASSY PARIS
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 3114
INFO RUEHMT/AMCONSUL MONTREAL PRIORITY 0141
RUEATSA/TSA WASHDC PRIORITY
UNCLAS PARIS 000978
SENSITIVE
SIPDIS
STATE FOR EB/TRA, IO/T, EUR/WE
MONTREAL FOR USICAO
TSA HQ FOR MACREARY
E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: EAIR PREL ICAO PTER FR
SUBJECT: FRANCE: ICAO AVIATION SECURITY PANEL DEMARCHE
REF: STATE 51523
1. (SBU) Econoff delivered reftel demarche May 16 to Alexandre
Crozat, Head of the Office for Civil Aviation Security Measures at
the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC). Crozat stressed that
France would wish to hear the ICAO discussions before coming to
final decisions on these issues. Nonetheless, he offered some
preliminary thoughts on the topics we raised.
2. (SBU) Flight crew compartment and POC network: He expressed some
doubts about the use of the POC network and was not sure it was a
priority to require infrastructure cabin changes to set up a
secondary barrier. However, France remained very motivated to
reaffirm the necessity of correctly protecting the cockpit,
primarily through personnel training. On enhancing the POC network,
Crozat was in favor of enlargement to include as many states as
possible, and agreed that testing should be done, though he thought
that issues for discussion with emergency contacts rather than
regular authorities would need to be chosen with care.
3. (SBU) Emerging Threats Working Group, AVSEC Panel, Audit
Transparency: France is interested in the idea of enhancing the
discussion of security related issues within ICAO, and thinks the
change from Aviation Security Panel to Commission could also be
looked at. On Emerging Threats he was not sure that it would be easy
to get colleagues to share intelligence information in the ICAO
environment - it was already very difficult within the G8. On the
change from Panel to Commission, Crozat was worried that too
frequent meetings would be a downside. He said that both actions
should be closely coordinated, to avoid duplication of efforts. On
the transparency of audit information, he stated "We are getting
more and more comfortable with the idea of transparency." France is
prepared to think about sharing mechanisms that ensure an adequate
protection of data, where useful information to mitigate the risk
from incoming flights can be gathered.
Stapleton