UN Security Council Demands Stringent Action To Combat Terror Funding

United Nations: The UN Security Council (UNSC) has demanded that all countries should take stringent action to combat the financing of terrorist organisations and to prosecute those funding terrorism. A resolution passed unanimously on Thursday said that every nation should have laws to prosecute serious criminal offences, the collection of funds or the provision of resources and services to terrorist organisations or individual militants and enforce them.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, whose country holds the Council presidency for the month, introduced the resolution at the session on terrorism funding. He said that to fight terrorism, the international community must tackle evil at its root by cutting off the sources of financing. Terrorists have learned to adopt new technologies for their use posing a great challenge, he said. But he added, “our determination must be equally great”. For this, he said, the UN’s Office of Counter-Terrorism (CTED) must develop its capacity to combat terrorist financing and work with other organisations.

India’s Permanent Representative Syed Akbaruddin criticised the lax implementation of the Council resolutions and UN measures against terrorism financing. He said that no effective actions have been taken against those not complying with sanctions. An expert on countering money-laundering and terrorism financing, Mercy Buku, said that the proliferation of mobile phone-based money transfer services and digital payment systems were vulnerable to exploitation by criminals because of the speed and convenience.

Governments should enact and enforce regulations to ensure that new technologies are not used to finance terrorism, she said via video-teleconference from Nairobi. Financial Action Task Force (FATF) President Marshall Billingslea told the Council that the risks of terrorism financing extend beyond the banking and financial sectors and governments should look for all the ways they may become vulnerable to terrorism financing.

FATF, which monitors and takes action against money laundering and terrorist financing, has put Pakistan on a “grey list” of countries that fail to adequately act against financing terrorists. (IANS)

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