Mongolia: Signatures and types of security

Mongolia recently received its Millenium Challenge Corporation grant from the United States.  There was a ceremony and press conference on October 22 with President Enkhbayar of Mongolia and President Bush of the United States at the White House.  These were some of President Enkhbayar's words, which well express the MCC aims of transparency, democracy, and poverty reduction:

As a partner country of the MCC program, Mongolia has been truly in the driver's seat at every stage of identifying its own development priorities and investment needs and policy directions. This new approach of cooperation is the key to ensuring efficiency and effectiveness of the program. The compact prepared through the broad consultative approach in Mongolia will support our efforts to broaden and deepen the country's economic development . . .

. . . Mongolia's national development strategy [was] submitted to the parliament for the consultation and approval. The strategy sets out the vision of a democratic society centered on developing a healthy and educated citizen and a prosperous private-sector-led economy, a society of true partnership and Mongol stakeholders, including the civil society.

And that USD 285 million will be used, according to Mr. Enkhbayar, for:

I am confident that the compact program will have a truly transformational impact on Mongolia's poverty reduction efforts through investment in our human capital, rehabilitation of vital transportation infrastructure and strengthening the institutional capacity of the public service agencies.

 . . . . We want our people to seize this opportunity to improve their livelihood with training and employment, to participate and benefit from the country's economic growth; to have access to high-quality service and education.

 Following that announcement, there has been a cascade of new U.S.–Mongolia bilateral agreements, with U.S. domestic security in mind.  First, Mongolia's Minister of Finance signed an anti-nuclear trafficking protocol with the U.S. Department of Energy Secretary –a Memorandum of Understanding against nuclear terrorism.  They are finding a Lot of Uranium in Mongolia these days, so this makes sense.  Some further reflection on neighbor states reveals that some of them also mine significant uranium, and some of them (the Democratic People's Republic of Korea springs to mind) like to have uranium on hand.  Last of all, there's plenty of non-state actors  who’d like to have it for their own nefarious purposes. 

As part of the Proliferation Security Initiative of the United States, Mongolia signed maritime ship-boarding agreements.  Though MSNBC/AP had a great laugh pointing out that Mongolia is home of the Gobi Desert and not the Pacific Ocean, Mongolia actually has 62 ships with “flags of convenience” in world shipping routes.   “Flags of convenience” signifies the use of ships registered in a foreign country to a. take advantage of diplomatic fast-tracking and consular services, and/or reduce taxation or regulatory incursions.  And there's all that Uranium . . . so it's a good idea–although it was nice to have the laugh.

Last of all, Mongolia's Foreign Minister and the U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Negroponte signed a “Joint Declaration of Principles for Closer Cooperation” which a. has aspirational topnotes but also b. paves the way for future MOUs.

Dear President Enkhbayar and retinue, I hope you also had an excellent time in Washington.  Don't forget to stock up on ball-point pens before you go home: I think you used all the ink you had.

Further reading:
Proliferation Security Initiative at the US State Department
Millenium Challenge, also a U.S. government Web site

Photos: Jwod catalogue, USDOS