- India has been consistently working towards fighting the menace of terrorism at both global and national front, thus adopting certain measures at policy level.
- At international level, India has proposed Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) at United Nations General Assembly which is under negotiation. Upon its adoption, the convention would provide legal basis for criminalizing all terrorist activities.
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- No international convention exists, that determines intelligence and evidence sharing, extradition of accused persons hiding outside national territory.
- This needs to be finalized at the earliest.
- India has also voted in favour of Resolution 34/8 of the Human Rights Council on ‘Effects of terrorism on the enjoyment of all human rights’.
- At national level, India has formulated and implemented many laws. Some of them are Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 Prevention of Terrorism Act, 2002 etc.
- A Central Scheme titled Central Scheme for Assistance to Civilian Victims of Terrorist/ Communal/Left Wing Extremist (LWE), Cross Border Firing and Mine/IED blasts on Indian Territory has been formulated.
National Security Guard (NSG):
National Security Guard was raised in 1984, following Operation Blue Star and the assassination of Indira Gandhi, “for combating terrorist activities with a view to protect States against internal disturbances”. The primary role of this Force is to combat terrorism in whatever form it may assume in areas where activity of terrorists assumes serious proportions, and the State Police and other Central Police Forces cannot cope up with the situation.
Money laundering and terrorism financing are often linked. When law enforcement is able to detect and prevent money laundering activities, it may also be preventing those funds from being used to finance acts of terror.
Financial Action Task Force (FATF):
- Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) policies largely originate and are modeled upon the report Forty Recommendations, which was published by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
- FATF works to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism through creating standardized processes to stop threats to the international financial system. It seeks to increase acceptance of anti-money laundering regulations across the globe. Eg: Pakistan is on greylist for two years.
- Following the FATF, world organizations, international financial institutions, and many national governments have pursued CFT initiatives and policies.
- The FATF also collects and shares information about trends in money laundering and terrorism financing and works closely with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, and the United Nations.
Steps needed to curb terrorism:
- A comprehensive and multidimensional strategy for the “War on Terror” must involve an integrated view of the strategic military and economic domains, among others.
- Financial institutions play an important role in combating the financing of terrorism because terrorists often rely on them, especially banks, to transfer money. Laws that require banks to perform due diligence on their customers and to report suspicious transactions can help prevent terrorism.
- Intelligence sharing: As terrorism is taking global form, intelligence sharing among countries is critical in preventing or minimizing the terror attacks. Eg: Easter attack possibility was shared by India to Sri Lanka, though it was not acted upon.
- Global cooperation on extremist content: Christchurch Call of Action outlined voluntary commitments from governments, ISPs to address issue of violent extremist content online. India is a signatory to this plan
- Global sanctions against nations that are State sponsors of terrorism. Eg: UNSC must come up with stringent sanctions against nations.
- Addressing UN High-Level conference on Heads of Counter Terrorism, India extended a five-point formula –
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- Exchange of timely and actionable intelligence.
- Prevention of misuse of modern communication through collaboration with the private sector.
- Building capacities for improved border controls.
- Sharing of info related to the movement of passengers.
- Designation of Counter-Terror focal points to fight global terror.
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- In addition, there should be a concerted effort from the countries affected by the scourge of terrorism to pressurize countries who engage in state-sponsored terrorism.
- It is necessary for countries fighting terrorism to learn more closely from their differences, rather than try to generalise from experience.
- The success or failure of each of these approaches must be studied & applied to smaller countries suffering from global terrorism based on applicability.
- United Nations must become the global Centre to fight global terrorism.
- The complete implementation of UN Global Counter-Terrorism Coordination Compact that was agreed upon in 2018.
- Intelligence sharing between countries needs to be strengthened and countries currently not affected by global terrorism need to take the threat seriously.
Conclusion:
- Terrorism is a complex, non-static phenomenon. Its associated motivations, financing and support mechanisms, methods of attack and choice of targets are often evolving, thereby compounding the challenges of ensuring the existence of an effective strategy to counter it. In this situation global cooperation is of paramount importance.
- India should play a proactive role to neutralize any threat of terrorism. There is a need for the world to join hands and take concrete multilateral initiatives to ensure that terror groups are dealt with a heavy hand. Accepting and ratifying the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) proposed by India would be good first step.
