Brussels, 03/01/2003 (Agence Europe) - The European Police Office Europol has drawn up a report on terrorist activities in the European Union from October 2001 to October 2002. The report was compiled from non-confidential information supplied by Member States and looks at tackling the ETA terrorist attacks in Spain and France which have continued despite "extensive cooperation between the authorities" of the two countries. During the period in question, ETA carried out 30 terrorist attacks, killing 6 people and injuring 170 others, 100 of them in a car-bomb attack in Madrid. Europol says ETA has the capacity to launch short and medium-term terrorist campaigns, despite a tactical ceasefire since the end of the Spanish Presidency of the Council of the EU last June.
In terms of Islamic terrorism, Europol notes that while no major attack took place in the European Union, attacks like those on a synagogue in Djerba (Tunisia) and on French nuclear engineers in Karachi (Pakistan) deliberately targetted European Union citizens or interests. Europol makes a country-by-country assessment of arrests in the EU of people suspected of being involved in Islamic terrorism.
The report also looks at the huge problems facing the peace process in Ireland; Corsican nationalists; anarchists in Spain, Italy, Greece and Germany; and the Red Brigades in Italy.