IMPACT Europe news digest [#2]
Welcome to the second instalment of the IMPACT Europe news digest. Through this series, the IMPACT Europe team endeavours to present you with a selection of news, commentaries, journals articles and web materials relating to research and policy developments touching on the subject matters underpinning IMPACT Europe’s project’s mission. To receive the latest updates on IMPACT Europe’s research, dissemination and outreach activities you can follow our Twitter account (@impacteurope) or sign up to our quarterly newsletter through our homepage.
NEWS & PUBLICATIONS
European Council December Meeting
European Council
The European Council held a periodic meeting in Brussels on 17 and 18 December 2015. Here, EU leaders took significant policy decisions aimed at sustaining the fight against terrorism by ensuring a closer co-operation between member states. In particular, conclusions adopted at the December meeting aim at: facilitating information sharing on foreign fighters; ensuring the interoperability of relevant databases and increasing support and contribution of Member States to Europol. Lastly, agreement was reached between co-legislators on a proposal for a Directive on the use of a passenger name record (PNR) data for the prevention, detection and prosecution of terrorist activities.
Link: http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2015/12/18-euco-conclusions/
Special meeting of the UN SC Counter-Terrorism Committee
United Nations
The United Nations Security Council held a special meeting of its Counter-Terrorism Committee on 16 and 17 December in New York, USA. The meeting was held under the title Preventing terrorists from exploiting the Internet and social media to recruit terrorists and incite terrorist acts while respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms and saw the participation of representatives from digital platforms and digital service providers, as well as of civil society activists and of the Chief Prosecutor of Paris. A Twitter hashtag (#Reclaimingtheweb) was launched to allow users to follow the event and continue discussing and networking around this issue beyond the meeting. Webcast recordings of the event can be seen through the link below.
Link: http://www.un.org/en/sc/ctc/docs/2015/Concept%20note_ICT_SpecialMeeting_2015.pdf
De-radicalization and the Prevention of Radicalization in Germany, Great Britain and Denmark
Asiem El Difraoui & Milena Uhlmann – Politique étrangère
From the journal abstract: To date, a few thousand Europeans have left Europe to join jihadi fighters in Syria and Iraq. Several hundred of them have already returned. To deal with this phenomenon, some countries have developed radicalization prevention and de-radicalization programs. Although it is still difficult to assess the effectiveness of these programs, the German, British and Danish examples at least provide certain lessons which could be very useful for France.
Link: http://www.cairn.info/revue-politique-etrangere-2015-4-page-171.htm
Tackling the Underlying Drivers of Violent Radicalization and Extremism
Hague Institute for Global Justice
The Hague Institute for Global Justice organised on 17 December a panel discussion under the title Tackling the Underlying Drivers of Violent Radicalization and Extremism. The event saw the participation of four speakers: Dr. Peter Neumann, Mr Henri van Eeghen, Dr David Connolly and Ms Agnese Macaluso. The discussion focused on global, national and local dimensions of radicalisation and extremism, as well as on existing counter-terrorism programmes and alternative measures adopted to tackle such phenomena. You can listen to the panel discussion through the link below: