When the application for the US Embassy to be built at Bamboo Avenue, Liguanea was conditionally approved by the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation (KSAC) Building and Town Planning Committee, the security concerns of affected residents were ignored, Angella Templer, chairperson of the Liguanea Area Coalition of Citizens Associations (LACOCA) has charged.

“This is not anti-American sentiment,” Templer insisted in an interview with the Observer. “We have asked what are the citizens’ rights for safety and security, in light of the draconian security measures that have been made by the US Government worldwide. We have had no answers.”

According to Templer, the US is encasing itself in that environment “because there is a real threat to it and that real threat becomes our real threat as well”.

The June 16 approval paves the way for the Americans to begin building a chancery, utility building, main compound access control, marine security guard quarters, service compound access control and consular compound access control buildings. But LACOCA complained to the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) and the Town and Country Planning Authority (TCPA) that residents were gravely concerned about their security.

NEPA spokesperson, Zadie Neufville told the newspaper that the TCPA had referred the security plans for the development to the Ministry of National Security for consideration. What could not be ascertained, however, was whether the TCPA considered the plan adequate in light of the high security risks associated with US embassies worldwide.

Of interest to LACOCA, in light of the al-Qaeda attack on the World Trade Centre in New York and the Pentagon building in Washington D C on September 11, 2001 that left hundreds dead, and the heightened security risks to US embassies worldwide from terrorism, is the effect any bombing or other attack on the embassy would have on their community.

The citizens are also alarmed that in the event of a terrorist attack or an attack perceived to be terrorist, the exclusion clause in all insurance policies would make “all coverage of vehicles, buildings and content, property and persons null and void”.

LACOCA believes that the embassy would be more suitably placed in an area such as the Industrial Park in Ferry, St Catherine, and argues that in the event of an attack, the US embassy, which is to be built with bulletproof windows and doors and other security measures, would be protected, but their homes would not be.

“The US Embassy has already contracted a company (CompuDyne) to supply bomb and bulletproof doors and windows for the proposed Liguanea complex,” LACOCA said.

With increasing terrorist threats at US embassies worldwide, security measures have been tightened, according to the Associated Press and Reuters. These measures must include:

. bollards (large, strong posts like those on a pier) and other vehicle barriers at all embassies;

. shatter-resistant film on windows; and

. counter-surveillance teams in some countries so the Americans can watch persons who might be watching them.

How the Mona reservoir, three churches, an old people’s residence, three high schools, three primary and preparatory schools, four major malls, banks, and hundreds of small businesses in Liguanea would fare in the event of a bomb attack on the US embassy was also a concern. LACOCA also wanted to know how a bomb blast would affect access to the University Hospital.

The association points out that in the bomb blasts at the US embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salam, Tanzania in 1998, a total of 258 people were killed and over 5,000 injured. Only 12 of the dead were Americans, and 173 Kenyans, with no connection to the embassy but who happened to be working or passing nearby, were among the dead. Properties and houses up to 1,000 metres away were damaged.

“One thousand metres takes in Wellington Drive, Wellington Glades, some of Beverly Hills, all of Standpipe, three churches, Mona Road residences towards Karachi and Mona Heights, the commercial area down to Sovereign and up towards Jamaica College, to say nothing of the Bamboo Avenue, Ottawa and Munro Road residents in the immediate vicinity,” LACOCA noted.

At a recent meeting of the association at Campion College, Colin Campbell, the former member of parliament for East St Andrew, who lives in the constituency, said that the siting of the embassy at the corner of Bamboo Avenue and Old Hope Road, in close proximity to some 30 communities and within the approximate location of at least eight of Jamaica’s premier schools and an already over-busy commercial area, was not appropriate.

“It is not an expression of hostility, it is not against visas, it is not against aid, it is just common sense in what is practical for us, for our investments, for our own safety concerns,” Campbell said.

LACOCA further charged that in securing its embassies, the US Government had, in several instances, disregarded the laws and regulations in several countries. “We are not the only country protesting against the erection of, or requiring changes to new super-secure embassies, but to date we are the smallest,” LACOCA claimed. “A few of the others are Germany, Norway, Mali, Bosnia-Herzegovina and South Korea.”

“What happens if they determine that they need a Green Zone or a Yellow Zone to secure the embassy?” the association asked. “These zones protect the embassy but leave the surroundings vulnerable.”

Campbell explained the implications of a Green Zone: “When the security situation deteriorates around the US compound, what they do is block it and you can’t even go near there, unless you are subject to the greatest degree of security checks. Perhaps you would have to park in New Kingston and walk home, because you definitely would not be allowed to drive your vehicle in there.”

But Orna Blum, public affairs officer at the US embassy, countered that the Green Zone or Yellow Zone designations were specific to the situation in Iraq. She said that the embassy had no jurisdiction for any of the areas outside its property.

“The Government of Jamaica has an obligation to protect all diplomatic missions in this country under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations,” Blum said. “We are not able to speculate on future security requests made by local authorities that would help the Government of Jamaica meet its obligation under that convention.”

But there are countries where the US has not depended solely on “security requests made by local authorities” to protect their embassies. According to a BBC World Internet report headlined “US security angers Mali Merchants”, after the 9/11 attacks, American officials began to erect a new set of barriers in the area around the embassy in Mali, “ignoring an order from the Malian Government that the work be stopped”.

“Hundreds of merchants who had the misfortune to find their shops inside the barriers erected around the embassy in 1998, after the bombings in Kenya and Tanzania, are furious. For the past three years, they have been requesting compensation for business lost because of the barriers, but to no avail,” the report said.

“They say they have been subjected to further humiliation as embassy security agents search all the merchandise they bring in to stock their shelves in shops where few clients bother to come these days.”

Security barriers the US Government wanted to erect at its embassy in Oslo, Norway have also been a source of annoyance for residents of that city. The Aftenposten English web desk in Oslo in February 2002 reported that the US embassy intended to construct “a three-metre-high (nine-foot) fence around the embassy, and a 10-metre ‘security zone’ that would extend into adjacent boulevards, and concrete blockades ringing the perimeter.

There were also complaints that the embassy’s plans would further impede traffic in the area. The embassy later agreed to remove from Oslo to a more suitable location. And a LACOCA document also cited concerns in South Korea where a US plan to construct a new 15-storey embassy building and an eight-storey residential complex for embassy staff in downtown Seoul was put on hold in the face of strong opposition from civic activists, who argued it could harm South Korea’s historical assets and ignore local regulations that prohibit the construction of high-rise buildings near historical sites.

Like Jamaica, the Korean Government had given the US Government permission in 1986 to put up the embassy. The embassy will now be constructed, not in the centre core of Seoul, but at Camp Corner in YongSan Garrison where US forces in South Korea are stationed. The building plans have also had to be changed to conform to traditional Korean styles and to be no more than two-and-a-half storeys, LACOCA said.