The UN Security Council concluded on Thursday a two-day meeting on measures to combat terrorism, pledging that the United Nations will continue to lead the global endeavor to fight terrorism despite the fact that considerable progress has been made in the process.
Following Wednesday's open debate, which saw the attendance of senior UN officials and representatives from over twenty countries, the 15-member council unanimously adopted Resolution 1805 on Thursday, extending the mandate of its Counter-Terrorism Committee's Executive Directorate (CTED) until 31 December 2010 and endorsing its revised organizational plan.
CONSIDERABLE PROGRESS
Briefing the Security Council on Wednesday, Mike Smith, CTED's executive director, said that the international community has made considerable progress in the fight against terrorism.
"Most countries had now criminalized terrorism," he said. "We have seen hundreds of new ratifications of the key counter-terrorism conventions and protocols."
"There has been an almost unprecedented level of international exchange of information and cooperation among relevant agencies across borders, with the purpose of disrupting planned terrorist attacks and enabling the arrest and prosecution of those engaged in terrorism," he said.
Now the need was less to ensure that countries understood the seriousness of the challenge and more to make sure they had the capacity and expertise to implement the counter-terrorism measures contained in Resolution 1373, adopted in the wake of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, he added.
The appalling 11 December 2007 bombing of the UN offices in Algiers, however, was a reminder that, notwithstanding the positive efforts, terrorism remained a serious threat to all and continued to evolve and manifest itself in new and dangerous ways, Smith said.
Member states must do more to address that threat and the United Nations must do a better job of helping them, he added.
UN PLAYS CENTRAL ROLE
The resolution adopted Thursday underscored "the central role of the United Nations in the global fight against terrorism" and said the council remained "determined to contribute further on enhancing the effectiveness of the overall effort to fight this scourge on a global level."
It urged CTED, whose "overarching goal" is to ensure the full implementation of Resolution 1373, "to continue strengthening its role in facilitating technical assistance ... aimed at increasing the capabilities of member states in the fight against terrorism by addressing their counter-terrorism needs."
It also urged the executive office to intensify cooperation with member states and relevant international organizations "with a view to enhancing member states' capacity to fully implement Resolution 1372 and to facilitate the provision of technical assistance."
Resolution 1373 obliges all UN member states to criminalize assistance for terrorist activities, deny financial support and safe haven to terrorists and share information about groups planning terrorist attacks.
Established in 2004, the CTED assists the council's Counter-Terrorism Committee in monitoring 1373's implementation.
OPPOSING DOUBLE STANDARDS
During the open debate, many representatives, especially those from developing countries, urged that a global fight against terror should not disregard the root causes and that practices of double stands should be eliminated.
Liu Zhenmin, China's deputy permanent representative to the United Nations, said that comprehensive counter-terrorism measures should focus on terrorism in its various manifestations, as well as its underlying causes and that China opposed attempts to link terrorism to any specific religious or ethnic minority groups, as well as the adoption of double standards.
Envoys from Cuba and Venezuela slammed the United States for its refusal to extradite Luis Posada Carriles, an alleged terrorist whose charges included the downing of a Cuban plane in 1976.
Calling Posada "the most notorious terrorist of the Western hemisphere," Cuba's Ambassador Rodrigo Malmierca Diaz criticized the U.S. government for charging him only with minor crimes.
The fight against terrorism should be carried out in full and it was not possible to eradicate terrorism if some acts were condemned while others were tolerated or justified, he said, stressing that double standards and impunity could not prevail in addressing terrorism.
Venezuelan's deputy ambassador Aura Rodriguez de Ortiz said that the Posada Carriles case was an example of a double standard by a U.S. government that claimed to fight terrorism.
U.S. diplomat Carolyn Willson countered that contrary to the statements made by Cuba and Venezuela, her country had taken a number of actions with respect to Posada Carriles.
In so doing, it had acted consistently with international law, as well as its domestic legal framework, which provided for due process and constitutional safeguards, Willson said.
Source:Xinhua
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