Director-General/Executive Director
Under-Secretary-General Voronkov,
Distinguished Ambassadors and colleagues,
Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,
It is my pleasure to join you today, and I would like to start by thanking USG Voronkov and the UN Office of Counterterrorism for inviting me to brief you.
This is an excellent opportunity to explain to our Member States how we are working to support their vision on preventing and countering terrorism.
The threat of terrorism remains urgent and dynamic.
A shifting global landscape is giving rise to emerging trends and challenges.
The first and perhaps most alarming trend I would like to highlight is the deteriorating situation in Africa.
According to the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, the continent saw a record-breaking 6,255 violent events linked to terrorist groups in in 2022.
Fatalities have also increased across the continent in 2022, up by fifty percent since 2019.
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime is on the ground, providing African countries with the tools and capacities they need to prevent terrorism and its financing, and to bring perpetrators to justice.
In Niger, we are providing support on collecting and using battlefield evidence; in Nigeria and in Burkina Faso, we are helping with the effective adjudication of terrorism cases, resulting in more convictions as well as more exonerations where there is not enough evidence; In Mozambique, we have been delivering capacity-building on criminal justice responses to terrorism in Cabo Delgado; In East Africa, we trained 600 law enforcement practitioners on organized crime and terrorism last year, boosting identified crimes, arrests, and seizures.
And across Africa, we have been partnering with the Inter-Parliamentary Union to engage parliamentarians, community leaders, faith leaders, and civil society to promote dialogue and build trust.
We are prioritising support to the Sahel and Coastal States where the intensity and frequency of attacks, as well as recruitment and radicalisation, are on the rise.
Excellencies,
Beyond the challenges facing Africa, developments in South and Central Asia have also given rise to new terrorism risks.
UNODC is working with Member States in the region to bolster border security, facilitate knowledge sharing, and assist with the return and reintegration of foreign terrorist fighters and their families.
Prison settings continue to represent a challenge, and our Office is engaged in Central and South Asia and beyond, to provide training and guidance on managing violent extremist prisoners and preventing radicalisation in prisons.
And globally, several thematic priorities are coming to the fore in the fight against terrorism and in our work at UNODC, including many identified in the seventh review of the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy in 2021.
The use of new technologies such as social media and cybercurrencies is adding a new dimension to terrorist threats; we are assisting Member States in using electronic evidence and special investigate techniques to keep the pace.
We are also equipping Member States with the tools to make their own use of new tech, to detect terrorist activity in a human-rights compliant manner.
And to prevent weapons of mass destruction from falling into the hands of non-state actors, especially during these times of instability, our Office is promoting and supporting the international legal framework against nuclear terrorism, including by training over 300 officials in different countries last year.
The nexus between terrorism and organized crime is another key priority. Terrorist groups in certain contexts can rely on different forms of trafficking as sources of financing, including firearms, cultural property, drugs, and even human beings.
As the guardian of the UN Convention against organized crime and its protocols, UNODC is perfectly positioned to assist countries in combating challenges to the rule of law holistically, breaking chains of collusion, striking at illicit networks, and addressing root causes.
UNODC’s holistic vision of terrorism challenges and solutions is reflected in our new Global Programme on Preventing and Countering Terrorism 2022-2027.
Launched last year, the new Programme is closely aligned with the priorities set out by Member States, including in the Global Strategy review.
The Programme adopts a people-centered and human-rights based approach to preventing and countering terrorism, working with civil society, youth, women, academia, and other forces of positive change.
Translating our vision into action requires robust partnerships, as often highlighted by Member States.
Our cooperation with UNOCT is particularly important, benefitting from each entity’s comparative advantages while carrying out joint work on issues such as countering terrorist travel, nuclear terrorism, prosecution, rehabilitation and reintegration.
UNODC also works with closely with CTED on a range of issues, including developing guidance on the collection and admissibility of battlefield evidence, and the use of digital evidence across borders.
We will continue coordinating closely with UNOCT and all members of the Counterterrorism Coordination Compact.
Ladies and gentlemen,
The threat of terrorism continues to evolve, and our responses must evolve with it.
The upcoming 8th review of the Global Counterterrorism Strategy will be an important landmark to review needs and priorities.
Leveraging our field network spanning more than 130 offices across all continents, our long-standing partnerships with frontline officers, and our expertise across the criminal justice chain, UNODC stands with you to step up efforts against terrorism.
Thank you.