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7831st Security Council Meeting: Threats to International Peace and Security
By resolution 2322 (2016), the 15-nation body underlined the importance of strengthening international cooperation, including by investigators, prosecutors and judges, in order to prevent, investigate and prosecute terrorist acts, and expressed concern at the use by terrorists of information and communications technologies.
The Security Council called upon States to share, where appropriate, information about foreign terrorist fighters and other individual terrorists and terrorist organizations, including biometric and biographic information, and stressed the importance of providing such information to national watch lists and multilateral screening databases.
The Council further called upon States to consider, where appropriate, downgrading for official use intelligence threat data on foreign terrorist fighters and individual terrorists to provide such information to front-line screeners, such as immigration, customs and border security and to appropriately share such information with other concerned States and international organizations. It also called upon States to exchange information and cooperate on administrative, police and judicial matters and to enhance cooperation to prevent terrorists from benefiting from transnational organized crime.
The Council called upon all States to consider establishing appropriate laws and mechanisms that allow for the broadest possible international cooperation, including the appointment of liaison officers, police-to-police cooperation, the creation and use, when appropriate, of joint investigation mechanisms, and enhanced coordination of cross-border investigations in terrorism cases.
It also called upon States to increase, where appropriate their use of electronic communication and universal templates. It encouraged States to consider extending access to, and where appropriate, integrate into their national systems, the International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) I-24/7 police information network beyond the National Central Bureaus to other national law enforcement entities.
The Security Council urged States to develop broad law enforcement and judicial cooperation in preventing and combating trafficking in cultural property that might benefit terrorists or terrorist groups, and also requested the Counter Terrorism Executive Directorate, with the assistance of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and in consultation with the Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force to prepare a report on the current state of international law enforcement and judicial cooperation related to terrorism, identifying major gaps, with recommendations to the Counter Terrorism Committee within 10 months.
Briefing the Council, Jean-Paul Laborde, Executive Director of the Counter-Terrorism Executive Directorate, said terrorism was an international threat requiring a global response. The focus, through a broader perspective, should be on strengthening international cooperation between Member States and international organizations. The Executive Directorate was closely collaborating with the International Organization of Prosecutors, among other organizations, as well as with regional organizations and civil society. That kind of cooperation strengthened States’ central authorities to receive information in a timely manner.
Among other things, the Executive Directorate was preparing to coordinate with INTERPOL in order to strengthen international cooperation between intelligence and justice agencies, he said, welcoming Spain’s initiative to accelerate the process. Through quick cooperation of agencies, including by using social media, counter-terrorism actions could be improved, he said.
Dorcas A. Oduor, Deputy Director, Office of the Public Prosecutions of Kenya, underscored that her country was a “frontline State” in the fight against international terrorism. Although enforcement of the law was the responsibility of the sovereign State, a coordinated international response and close regional coordination was vital, as was regional and international judicial cooperation that used well-defined standards.
International judicial cooperation against terrorism was hampered by many factors, including divergent approaches and priorities among nations, she said. The international community needed to come up with more instruments that set standards for best practices and cooperation. It also needed to institutionalize sharing of intelligence and data and deepen existing cooperation among law enforcement agencies worldwide, including through INTERPOL. No country could tackle the challenge of terrorism alone, she emphasized. Solidarity was needed.
Robert R. Strang, Executive Secretary of the International Institute for Justice and the Rule of Law, said efforts to bring individuals to justice required the sharing of evidence across jurisdictions. That was particularly true for foreign terrorist fighters and relevant evidence related to their travel, communications, and recruiting activity through social media. International cooperation between judicial authorities must ensure that evidence was gathered in a form that could be used in court.
He said a key part to making such a system work was the role of central authorities, the national entities responsible for mutual legal assistance and the extradition of individuals. All Member States should establish a central authority to concentrate experience and resources, reduce bureaucracy and ensure visibility and accountability. Member States should also empower their central authorities to facilitate the judicial aspect of extradition requests.
After the briefings speakers hailed the unanimous adoption of resolution 2322 (2016) as a milestone in the fight against terrorism, noting that judicial cooperation in addressing issues such as foreign terrorist fighters, financing of terrorism, extradition and exchange of evidence were transnational issues that required a global approach.
Rafael Catalá, Minister of Justice of Spain, which holds the Council Presidency for December, strongly condemned the recent attacks in Istanbul, Cairo, Mogadishu and Aden. The rule of law could confront and overcome terrorism, he said, but international cooperation was essential to fight against all types of transnational crime and terrorism. The resolution was a milestone and another tool the international community could use to tackle the terrorist threat.
Egypt’s representative thanked all speakers who had expressed solidarity with his country for the recent terrorist attack that resulted in the deaths of 25 people who had been praying in a historical church in Cairo. He said international judicial cooperation was one of the most important pillars in the fight against the scourge. The adopted text carried an important message to the international community on the need to overcome narrow interests and, instead, promote international judicial cooperation. The political will of States was necessary to implement the Council resolutions. States that did not abide fully by implementation should be held accountable.
The representative of the United States said that disrupting terrorist networks required law enforcement agencies to talk to each other, adding that she supported assembling joint investigative teams to look at specific incidents. All must do more to ensure law enforcement officials had a chance to work directly with each other.
Other speakers called for more cooperation with INTERPOL, with the representative of Japan saying that that organization gave national agencies access to its lost and stolen passports database that had records of more than 68 million lost or stolen passports. However, more than 100 countries were not using that database, enabling terrorists to sneak across borders unnoticed.
While many speakers urged strengthening cooperation through the use of information technology, the representative of Uruguay, however, warned that cooperation requests in the digital sphere should be carried out with respect for human rights, privacy and freedom of thought.
Also speaking today were representatives of the United Kingdom, Angola, Ukraine, New Zealand, Venezuela, China, Senegal, Malaysia, France and Russian Federation.
The meeting began at 3:07 p.m. and ended at 5:24 p.m.
