Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi told the US Ambassador two months before the last election that a new Nationalist government would reactivate Malta’s membership of Nato’s Partnership for Peace programme.
The commitment to join the PfP was never made public and was one of the very first decisions taken by the PN government soon after the election, causing widespread furore.
The revelation was made in a leaked US Embassy cable published by whistleblower site Wikileaks yesterday.
The commitment was made to former US Ambassador Molly Bordonaro in January 2008, a month before Dr Gonzi called the election that was held in March, according to the leaked cable.
Another embassy cable, in February, giving the State Department an overview of the election that had just been announced, expressed concern that a victory for the Labour Party would impact US interests “in several ways, including by reducing possibilities for multilateral security cooperation”.
However, Malta’s participation in the PfP programme seems to have been of great interest to the US as evidenced by other leaked cables.
A cable sent to the State Department by the US Embassy in Malta in November 2009 said former Ambassador Douglas Kmiec found comments by Labour foreign affairs spokesman George Vella on Malta’s participation in the programme as “troublesome”.
The cable was reporting on Prof. Kmiec’s first meeting with Labour leader Joseph Muscat and Dr Vella.
It quotes Dr Vella saying that the country’s reactivated membership of PfP was “invalid as it failed to comply with Malta’s Treaties Act” because the government had not referred the matter to Parliament.
However, the cable does reveal the PL’s willingness, unspoken of in public, to accept Malta’s PfP membership.
“The PL, Dr Vella indicated, had come to the conclusion that PfP membership was not contrary to the neutrality clause of Malta’s Constitution and would have been willing to work with the government to rejoin,” the cable said.
The ambassador had also noted the PL’s reluctance to accept any status of forces agreement (SOFA). These agreements generally establish the framework under which US military personnel operate in a foreign country, addressing how the domestic laws of the foreign jurisdiction shall be applied towards US personnel while in that country.
The status of forces agreement was also on the agenda of a meeting between Foreign Minister Tonio Borg and Prof. Kmiec in February last year.
According to a confidential cable, Dr Borg told the US Ambassador that Dr Gonzi was “prepared to go forward” on a Nato-sponsored, PfP status of forces agreement.
The sensitivity of the subject was also highlighted by the fact that Dr Borg and Prof. Kmiec only spoke about the matter “outside the presence of note takers”.
“While recognising that Malta has concerns pertaining to sovereign jurisdiction and some national laws such as those relating to the wearing of uniforms, carrying of weapons, etc., which are contrary to PfP SOFA provisions, Ambassador Kmiec urged the Foreign Minister not to make any gratuitous reservation or modification to the standard document if at all possible and he promised to forward a copy by messenger,” the cable said.
The highly-sensitive nature of the discussion was also highlighted by the fact that Dr Borg said it was his wish for the SOFA acronym to be “kept out as much as possible of the public discussion”.