Brussels, 20/11/2015 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 19 November, France presented the United Nations Security Council with a resolution calling on all countries to enhance and coordinate their efforts to prevent and avert terrorist attacks committed specifically by the organisation Islamic State (IS).
The French ambassador to the United Nations, Francois Delattre, said France had proposed a short, strong draft resolution focused on a priority target - the fight against a common enemy, IS. He added that the exceptional and unprecedented threat posed by this group for the whole of the international community demanded a strong, united and unambiguous response from the Security Council.
The resolution calls on states than have the capacity to do so to take all necessary measures to stop the terrorist acts carried out by IS and terrorist groups associated with Al-Qaeda on the territory controlled by IS in Syria and Iraq in compliance with international law. A diplomat is cited by French news agency AFP as saying that this was not about the UN giving legal authorisation to strikes against IS in Syria and Iraq, but rather political support for operations in the future. He said that the legal basis of the French air raids was Article 51 of the UN Charter, which allows any country to defend itself against attack.
The French resolution calls again on countries to intensify their efforts to stem the flow of foreign terrorist fighters to Iraq and Syria, and to avert and prevent the financing of terrorism. In September 2014, the UN Security Council passed a resolution to boost the coherence of international action against the foreign fighters phenomenon. In 2013, it also adopted a number of resolutions to hinder the financing of IS's operations.
In the evening of 18 November, Russia presented a new version of the draft resolution it presented at the end of September, which recommended involving the Bashar al-Assad regime in the fight against extremist groups in Syria - something the West opposes. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)