Alexander Dichek
Chairman of the international
non-governmental organization
“International Antiterrorism Unity”

About Conceptual Approaches to Development of the Model of the National Program of Terrorism and Extremism Counteraction

Dear friends and colleagues!
Today we have to admit that contemporary international terrorism is an extremely dangerous social and political phenomenon of the 21st century the birth to which was given in conditions of the global world. I would like to draw your attention to some facts. Nowadays there are more than one thousand terrorist groups and organizations which use terrorist methods operating in more than 70 states. To prepare and organize terrorist attacks, specifically by Al Quaeda, around 30 million dollars are spent every year. On the other hand, only to monitor financial transactions and money transfers made by terrorist organizations and their sponsors state authorities spend more than 600 million dollars. And this is just a small part of the economic statistics. Nevertheless, human tragedies and pain after the terrorist attacks on the United States, Spain, Russia, Iraq, India, Afghanistan and the Philippines have no price or statistical equivalent. Trying to gain influence on formation of the new world order international terrorism in its ideological part and practical implications is targeted at mass annihilation of people and civilized relations in society. Resource base of contemporary terrorism – financial, personnel, informational and technological – is so high that we can say that the world enters a new era marked by possible use of weapons of mass destruction in terrorist activities.
Today prominent political leaders – UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the High Representative of EU for the Joint Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana and leading specialists in the field of combating terrorism state openly that exclusively military and force methods of counteraction make it impossible to win in the fight against terrorism. State is known to begin a war on terror but it is society who wins it. This was also stressed by the President of Ukraine in his address to American legislation establishment. But real power of international community to counteract to this universal evil is still to be questioned on the level of international and national security structures.
“International Antiterrorism Unity” and our associates declare that the time has come for honest politicians to admit that without support of consolidated civil forces of society it is impossible to develop and implement efficient strategy of terrorism and extremism counteraction. The strategy that would take into account, first of all, reasons and factors favoring and stimulating the cult of violence and terrorism. It is exactly here where we see the leading preventive role of non-governmental organizations epitomizing national, religious, professional, informational, psychological and other diversity of cultures of the single human civilization. And that is what we stress.
Dear colleagues! Ukraine is a part of a global world and like all industrially developed countries is subjected to threats of the modern life. However, our country has huge and extensive experience of years of harmonized and mutually beneficial contacts between national cultures and tolerance to various religions. We have a right to say so despite complicated national history of ideological and military cataclysms. And here lies our main distinctive feature differentiating us from other European countries which have lived through decades of religious wars and large-scale ethnical oppression. We can be on firm ground saying that at present Ukraine is not the country of systematic terrorism. Still there are prerequisites – internal and external – for possible negative developments. External factors which correspond to the notion of being systematic include participation of Ukrainian peace-keeping forces in operations of Antiterrorism coalition in Iraq, presence of our military forces in different conflict zones exercising their peace-keeping duties, increase of migration trends especially from the regions with intensive terrorist activities. Among internal factors promoting terrorist threats and tendencies I would mention mainly social and economic factors – segmentation of society according to income distribution, relatively weak and inefficient executive and judicial branches of state power, fomentation of regional conflicts, political bias in the issues of Crimean Tatars. That is why in circumstances marked by new threats the whole philosophy of contemporary international and national security system should be revised.
We believe that new principles of national security system should become the backbone of the terrorism counteraction strategy involving both state and social institutions. The real step in this direction, in our opinion, can become the Model of the National Program of Extremism and Terrorism Counteraction which was designed by our scientists – the best analysts of IAU.
Dear friends! Let me introduce some conceptual approaches to the Model of the National Program of Extremism and Terrorism Counteraction taking into account the role of public component in the system of national security. I would like to stress that this is a strategic initiative by IAU which I hope will receive your support and interest on international level. The initiative of this kind was the first to be suggested by a non-governmental organization. More information you can find in the handouts.
The goal of the Model of the National Program of Extremism and Terrorism Counteraction is to create internal and external conditions for active counteraction to extremism and terrorism on a principally new conceptual base. A complex of scientific, technological, political, organizational, legal, social, economic, civil, informational, cultural, humanitarian and educational arrangements creates the contents of the Program. These measures are tailored to secure safe and civilized development of society by removing reasons and factors promoting ideology and practices of extremism and terrorism. Please look through the suggested Model and give your opinion about it. I would like to highlight some principal aspects.
We base our Program on the necessity of theoretical and practical study of a new concept of national security architecture. It should be designed on a solid scientific, technological and informational platform that will enable to create a unified research system to study mechanisms and nature of violent stereotypes in interpersonal relations conducive to extremism and terrorist actions. And which seems particularly important is that this approach can serve to create adequate schemes of counteraction including the potential of public diplomacy and preventive measures. Once again I would like to stress the importance of implementation of international standards of antiterrorism operations in the national legislation. I guess that legal norms to ban terrorist organizations and a law about extremism control need to be developed. Still the domineering component of the Model of the National Program is its informational and humanitarian functions. We are sure that new spiritually safe educational system of the 21st century should focus on personal development, acceptance of cultural diversity of the world and tolerance to religious traditions of other nations. Priority of high human values should become fundamental in counteraction to the ideology of terrorism.
In relation to this I would like to draw your attentions to one very dispiriting fact. Contemporary terrorism is mostly supported by young people under 30. Careful educational work is required to block the disruption of social and cultural norms and personality degradation. Undoubtedly, humanitarian and economic projects to overcome homelessness, unemployment, drug abuse and other activities designed to minimize the social base of terrorism. Informational measures of terrorism and extremism counteraction imply the use of a wide range of informational resources to dethrone the ideology of terrorism and violence. We suppose that when exercising informational counteraction function mass media should act as subjects of national security system securing constitutional rights and freedoms of people, unearthing and overcoming social problems of society and performing their monitoring and controlling roles. Mass media assume the biggest responsibility to form such moral atmosphere in society that will discredit terrorism and extremism. In social and economic field the Civil Project was suggested by such famous non-governmental organizations as the UUIB, Association of Ukrainian Banks, International Antiterrorism Unity, New Formation, Union of Lawyers and Union of Journalists of Ukraine.
Civil Project of formation of a non-governmental business security system is a new form of social partnership between state and society, authorities and businessmen. This cooperation aims at building a non-governmental security system. To achieve this goal we need to ensure that organizational and legal functioning of business is provided as well as its security – mechanisms monitoring transparency and integrity of economy, favorable investment climate and joint endeavors of productive forces of society to fight against negative tendencies. And we can already boast of having positive results in these issues.
The next technology which is being actively developed and deployed is educational. Cooperation of the National Academy of the State Security Service of Ukraine, European University and IAU in the field of promoting a complex “Security – Anti-terror” (scientific, educational and manufacturing facility) produce the first results. Two weeks ago graduates of the European University who had done the course “Anti-terror” received their diplomas. Thus social institutions, European University and special services cooperate closely with each other to train specialists who can not only manage security issues but also look into antiterrorism matters.
Finally, I would like to emphasize that the International Antiterrorism Unity, which I am honored to represent, with the suggested and other initiatives reflects consolidated attempts of social forces of Ukraine to establish and implement social partnership with state institutions to respond adequately to contemporary challenges and threats. We hope that the Model of the National Program of Extremism and Terrorism Counteraction will be supported and will be sent to the interested state institutions, first of all to the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine for its perspective development and implementation.