Threat of terrorism: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Saturday highlighted the growing global threat of terrorism, particularly in Asia and Africa, despite the UN Security Council’s (UNSC) best efforts to combat the “gravest threat to humanity”.
Jaishankar, who was addressing a special meet of the UNSC Counter-Terrorism Committee in the national capital, said, “Terrorism remains the gravest threat to humanity. The UN Security Council in the past two decades has evolved an important architecture built, primarily around the counter-terrorism sanctions regime to combat this menace. This has been very effective in putting the countries on notice that had turned terrorism into a state-funded enterprise.”
Growing threat
“Despite this, the threat of terrorism is only growing and expanding, particularly in Asia and Africa, as successive reports of 1267 sanctions committee monitoring reports have highlighted,” he added.
India is hosting the two-day anti-terrorism meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC). The ongoing meeting in Delhi is being held under India’s chair of the Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC).
Jaishnkar said CTC members presence in Delhi at the special meeting showed how much importance the UNSC member states and other stakeholders placed on this critical and emerging facet of terrorism.
“That the council is holding this special meeting of its counter-terrorism meetings in India, is also a product of the fact that counterterrorism has become one of the top priorities during our ongoing tenure in the security council,” he added.
Technology abused
Emerging technologies had a flip side to them, Jaishnakar said and added that governments and regulatory bodies faced new challenges that virtual private network, encrypted message services, and blockchains have thrown up.
“The technologies have also thrown up new challenges for governments and regulatory bodies due to their potential vulnerability for their misuse by non-state actors, given the very nature of some of these technologies and the nascent regulatory environment,” the minister said.
Tech access
“In recent years, terrorist groups, ideological fellow travellers particularly in open and liberal societies and lone wolf attackers have enhanced their capabilities by gaining access to tech. They use tech, money and ethos of open societies to attack freedom, tolerance, and progress,” he added.
Jaishankar said terrorists and militant groups use internet and social media platforms as potent weapons in their toolkit for spreading propaganda, radicalisation, and conspiracy theories aimed at destabilising societies.
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