Director-General/Executive Director
Doha, 14 April 2015
Excellencies,
Ladies and gentlemen,
Thank you for coming to this high-level event aimed at strengthening national and international cooperation in preventing and countering terrorist financing.
Terrorist organizations raise funds from a variety of sources, mostly illegitimate, including criminal activities such as the illicit trafficking of drugs, arms, cultural property and natural resources.
Over the past decade, we have witnessed the strengthening and increased sophistication of links between transnational organized criminal networks and terrorists in many regions of the world.
In Afghanistan, taxes on drug lords may bring in as much as 200 million dollars a year for the Taliban.
In West Africa, and the Sahel, violent extremists and criminal groups involved in drug trafficking and piracy in the Gulf of Guinea offer further proof of the growing nexus between transnational organized crime and terrorism.
Boko Haram in Nigeria has been involved, directly or through levying taxes, in the illicit trafficking of drugs and natural resources.
In East Africa, Al Shabaab earns millions from the illicit charcoal trade.
ISIL and Al Nusra Front are believed to facilitate the smuggling of chemical precursors for the production of captagon, as well as the smuggling of antiquities.
Recognizing the gravity of this nexus, the UN Security Council, in its recent resolutions 2195 and 2199, underscored the need for redoubled efforts to prevent terrorists from benefiting from transnational organized crime, including through measures to stop corruption, money-laundering and illicit financial flows.
Therefore, a clear priority is to disrupt terrorist threats to the extent possible by robustly tackling the different methods used for their financing.
First and foremost, the necessary national legal frameworks to criminalize the financing of terrorism need to be in place.
There is also a need to strengthen the regulatory frameworks for banks and other financial institutions, to be able to identify and prevent terrorist funding, and to be able to effectively detect, investigate and prosecute terrorism financing-related crimes, including through freezing of assets.
Law enforcement authorities must have specialized expertise to effectively prosecute and investigate crimes related to terrorist financing.
In cases involving alliances with organized crime networks, UNODC's experience has shown that the criminals represent the weaker link, and expose themselves to potential detection through their illicit activities.
Therefore, the tactics and expertise used to go after organized crime groups need to be employed.
Furthermore, terrorists often route money through countries with weak counter-financing laws and expertise. International cooperation is, therefore, essential.
In fact, the most frequently identified technical assistance needs in countering terrorist financing are one, strengthening the effective cooperation between national agencies which are involved directly or indirectly in fighting terrorist financing, and two, enhancing cooperation between regional and international networks.
In order to effectively support Member States, the UN has established a working group chaired by UNODC on countering the financing of terrorism, as part of the Counterterrorism Implementation Task Force (CTITF).
Furthermore, UNODC, which has been tasked with promoting the ratification and full implementation of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, leads a strong programme related to the prevention and suppression of terrorist financing.
Our role as guardian of the Conventions against transnational organized crime and corruption further support these efforts, which are coordinated by the Global Programme against Money Laundering, Proceeds of Crime and the Financing of Terrorism (GPML).
Examples of our work include an ongoing initiative to enhance national capacities of criminal justice institutions in Latin America, as well as the use of "mentors" working with FIUs, law enforcement and other bodies.
The evolving threat of foreign terrorist fighters, as recognized in General Assembly Resolution 68/276 and Security Council Resolution 2178, is another area on which UNODC is focusing.
We are cooperating with Member States from the Middle East and North Africa, as well as the Balkan region, to develop effective legal regimes against foreign terrorist fighters, based in the rule of law, due process and human rights.
In the framework of this cooperation, UNODC launched a major programme in Malta last month aimed at strengthening the capacity of the MENA countries to prevent and suppress terrorism, particularly the threats posed by foreign terrorist fighters.
With regard to preventing and countering the financing of terrorism in the context of foreign terrorist fighters, the programme provides technical assistance to Member States, focusing in particular on model procedures, good practices and measures related to investigation, prosecution, adjudication and international cooperation.
Going after the terrorist "business model" and disrupting financial flows remains a major challenge, one that requires a comprehensive, integrated approach that reaches out to all sectors and actors involved, private and public, and leaves no gaps for the terrorists and criminals to exploit.
This is an evolving threat, with ever-changing modi operandi. We need to be swift, innovative and ready to learn.
We have a distinguished panel of experts and participants to take this dialogue forward, and I am looking forward to hearing the results of these discussions.
Thank you.