[Editor’s note: This document was released both as a State Department cable as part of its 1981 FOIA release, and as Serial 54 of the FBI’s RYMUR release.
[The text for this document was released in 2014 by the now-defunct Wikileaks website at https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/1978GEORGE03850_d.html. This URL may be available through the Wayback Machine.]
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GEORGE 03850 220212Z
ACTION ARA-15
INFO OCT-01 ISO-00 FBIE-00 JUSE-00 CIAE-00 INR-10
NSAE-00 CA-01 H-01 L-03 SS-15 NSCE-00 INRE-00
SSO-00 CCO-00 /046 W
——————001819 220220Z /73
O 220100Z NOV 78
FM AMEMBASSY GEORGETOWN
TO SECSTATE WASHDC NIACT IMMEDIATE 8131
C O N F I D E N T I A L GEORGETWON 3850
E.O. 11652: GDS
TAGS: CASC OREP (RYAN, LEO) GY
SUBJECT: FBI PRESENCE IN GUYANA
1. Minister Green [Guyana Minister Of Health, Housing, and Labor Hamilton Green] during his afternoon meeting with the Ambassador [John Burke, U.S. Ambassador to Guyana], raised with him the report the Guyana government had received that a southern newspaper in the US was carrying an item that the GOG [Government of Guyana] had requested assistance from the FBI in its examination of the incident at Jonestown. Minister Green then proceeded to ask Ambassador if indeed there were agents of the FBI in country. Ambassador replied that legal attache from Caracas had arrived morning of November 21 and that he (Ambassador) had called Commissioner of Police [Lloyd Barker] to inform him of the legal attache’s presence and to request an appointment for the legal attache with the police commissioner. Minister Green then went on to say that the presence of FBI agents in Guyana presents a political problem for the government. He impled that the government was prepared to accept the presence of the legal attache as long as he was already in country; however, the government would want no more agents at this time.
2. Ambassador expects to be able to arrange appointment with legal attache with Police Commissioner morning
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of Wednesday November 22. If this appointment goes well and liaison arrangement can be made between legal attache and Guyana police, there is always the possibility repeat possibility that other agents may be admitted if it can be proven to the GOG that they had clearly something to gain from the arrangement.
Burke [John Burke, U.S. Ambassador to Guyana]
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