The Regional Conference on Strengthening Legal and Policy Mechanisms to Prevent Radicalization and Violent Extremism was organized by the Terrorism Prevention Branch of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC/TPB) in cooperation with the Hedayah Centre of Excellence on Countering Violent Extremism in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, from 21 to 23 October 2014.
The purpose of the conference was to discuss criminal justice and policy-making strategies to prevent terrorism through countering radicalization and violent extremism in Afghanistan, the Gulf and Middle East regions. The event provided a framework for presentations and in-depth discussions of practical aspects, such as building and implementing an efficient and rule of law-based criminal justice strategy to prevent terrorism, identification of national and regional challenges in countering radicalization and violent extremism, the use of the Internet for recruitment and training purposes by terrorist organizations, as well as several round-tables on national context and experiences. The rights of victims of acts of terrorism during criminal proceedings and their role in countering terrorist narratives were also discussed using concrete examples.
Senior experts from the participating countries all shared national experiences and expertise highlighting their growing concerns with regards to violent extremism. Many of them also requested UNODC/TPB's support to develop appropriate, efficient and rule-of-law compliant national criminal justice strategies.
This regional event was a follow-up to a previous regional event on the legal aspects of terrorism prevention that was held in the United Arab Emirates on 21-23 May 2013, and is a good evidence of the increasing cooperation and partnership of the Branch with the Member States of the Gulf region, several activities for which are also planned for 2015.