European Council President Donald Tusk called on Wednesday 21 September for a global anti-terrorism strategy to be developed.
“Building a global strategy and network against terrorism is key, including in preventing radicalisation and confronting the issues of foreign fighters and terrorist financing”, he stated in his speech to the 71st General Assembly of the United Nations in New York. Terrorism “will touch all of us sooner or later, which is why we should make better use of the United Nations to fight it together”, he went on. He underlined that the EU is already working with partners from Asia to the Gulf and the Sahel on building up global capacities against violent extremism.
High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy expressed her support of the “five Rs” proposed by the Netherlands – results, resources, relations, reinforcement and renewal. “This sounds to me like a good roadmap for our work” in the Global Counter Terrorism Forum, she said at the Forum’s ministerial meeting, also in New York. In her speech, she stated that “the strength of (the EU’s) partners is our own strength”, stressing the need to focus on capacity building in the Middle East and North Africa, in Turkey and the Western Balkans, in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa.
“We have developed our network of counterterrorism experts in the EU Delegations. We currently manage a network of 11 counterterrorism and security experts posted to EU delegations in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Turkey”, she pointed out, adding that this network has just been expanded to Chad and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Lastly, she indicated that the EU was currently investing over €150 million to help its partners who are working on new strategies to prevent violent extremism. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)