disec study guide topic 2 - bismun conference...

DISEC STUDY GUIDE

TOPIC 2

A: Bd. Mihail Kogălniceanu nr. 36-46, Complexul Studenţesc Mihail Kogălniceanu, Cămin B, camera 122B

E: [email protected] W: www.unyouth.ro Tel: 0213104264

Topic B: Tackling the issue of disarming terrorist

organizations

1. Introduction ……………………………………………………………...3

2. Definitions …………………………………………………………….....4-5

3. Important terrorist groups……………………………………………..…6-7

3. Historical background and legal instruments………………………….....8-9

4. Current situation and issues ……………………………………………...10-11

5. Points to be addressed. ………………………………….......…………….11

6. Useful Maps……………………………………………………………….12

7. Bibliography ……………………………………………………………..13-14

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.unyouth.ro/



Introduction to the topic

Terrorism is a global issue that domineers the life of millions of people around the world.

Terrorism is the name given by the international community to describe the acts and the organizations

that are consisted by groups of people who form illegal communities known as terrorist organizations.

The forms and goals of terrorism vary, but the way that its supporters will achieve their aspiration is

through a system built and established through violence and terror.

The main spots of terrorism, nowadays, lie, mainly, in Africa and the Middle East. This

issue is hugely concerning the UN and more specifically the Security Council and the 1st committee

(DISEC), due to the fact that its size is growing not only in numbers of proponents but also in

numbers of victims. The extremism is an issue that differs from country to country but the roots

seem to remain the same, the dominance of the radical Islam or the dominance of a group of

antiregimes against the legal government of a state.

The terrorist organizations possess a vast amount of deadly weapons in their arsenals and

an increasing, hour by hour, budget that seems to come from sponsors that benefit from this

situation. The global community is trying to fight against this “plague” using multiple tools that

vary from soft to hard power, but the problem remains as long as the terrorists are armed and

loaded with fatal weapons and means.

It is of vital importance, that before discussing the problem in depth there is need to

understand the word terrorism as an idea that derives from radicalism, extremism and from people

that lack the basic staff and principles of education. What is more, no final proposals can be made

without evaluating the current situation and without detecting the ones who support by any means

this idea. Emphasis should be given to all the conflict areas that suffer from the ideology such as

Syria, Nigeria, Somalia, Iraq etc. The purpose of the committee will be to find a general framework





with which the international community will solve the hot issue of disarming the terrorist

organizations

Useful definitions

Terrorism: One of the many and most frequent terms used to describe this

phenomenon is: “The unlawful use of violence and intimidation, especially against civilians, in

the pursuit of political aims”1

On countless occasions, the United Nations recognized that creating an internationally

agreed definition of terrorism would make the clash against this phenomenon more effective.

However, without one universally accepted definition, a framework for global cooperation against

terrorism has been established gradually since 1963 in numerous international treaties2

Terrorism is “any action, in addition to actions already specified by the existing

conventions on aspects of terrorism from the Geneva Conventions and Security Council resolution

1566 (2004), that is intended to cause death or serious bodily harm to civilians or non-combatants,

when the purpose of such an act, by its nature or context, is to intimidate a population, or to compel

a Government or an international organization to do or to abstain from doing any act”.3 Actions

including or facilitating terrorism such as hijacking of civilian airplanes, hostage-taking, nuclear

terrorism or terrorism financing were among others placed in the catalog.

Terrorist organizations: They are political movements that use terror as a weapon to

achieve their goals, whether they are based on ideology, religion, or expansionary aspirations.

1 https://en.oxforddictionaries.com 2 http://www.europarl.europa.eu/ 3 http://www.un.org/news/dh/infocus/terrorism/sg%20high-level%20panel%20report-terrorism.htm



https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/

http://www.europarl.europa.eu/

http://www.un.org/news/dh/infocus/terrorism/sg%20high-level%20panel%20report-terrorism.htm



Terrorism Funding: The term funding is usually found under the following definition:

Money provided, especially by an organization, for a particular purpose4:

Regarding the more specific term of terrorism financing, this is a form of supporting

and facilitating criminal behavior. This form of support (either financial or material) may come

from state or non-state actors. The International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing

of Terrorism provides key standards.5

Terrorist organizations Disarming: A simple and common definition for the disarming

action is the following “Take a weapon or weapons away from a person, force, or country”6. This

term can be enriched with the word terrorist organizations regarding our topic. The disarmament

can include violent and non-violent methods with a main goal the de-radicalization, the weakening

or the complete destruction of these entities. Smart-“diplomatic”7 or hard power choices are among

the options.

4 https://en.oxforddictionaries.com 5 http://www.un.org/law/cod/finterr.htm 6 https://en.oxforddictionaries.com 7 the word is put into brackets due to the fact that no diplomatic activity can occur between the states and the

terrorist organizations. The terrorist organizations are NOT recognized politically(or anything else) and by no means

they can acquire legal-formal international representation.




http://www.un.org/law/cod/finterr.htm




Important terrorist groups

The deadliest and most powerful terrorist organizations among others are the

following

• ISIS (The Islamic State of Iraq and the

Levant/ISIL/IS/Daesh) World’s most powerful terrorist organization, “solid”

enough to rout several battalions of a national army. Its operations are taking

place in 18 countries around the world (mainly in Pakistan, Egypt,

Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Somalia and Egypt). Their main opponents and

enemies are the United States and all of its allies, all the other western





countries, the Salafis, the Shiites8 and of course all the governments of the

states whose land9 they have conquered. Their main goal is the establishment

of a huge Islamic caliphate and more specifically in a few words they want an

Islamic State and they want it right now.

• Boko Haram: It may not be the biggest terrorist organization

in the world, but it is the deadliest. Boko Haram, had very strong relations and

ties with Al-Qaeda but in March 2015 it announced its support and loyalty

towards Daesh/ISIS, so their goals are pretty much the same. Its main area of

operations is located in Nigeria, Cameroon, Niger and Chad

• Al-Qaeda: Although there are several ideological

similarities, its main difference with ISIS and Boko Haram is that they were

never concerned about the immediate establishment of an Islamic caliphate.

The formation of a global movement of muslisms 10 that will be pivoted on

the westerners seems to be their ultimate goal. They seem to be attached to the

beliefs of their deceased former leader Osama bin Laden and that is the reason

that they are in an open war against ISIS.11

• Taliban: Sunni Islamic fundamentalists-former governors of

Pakistan12 and in close relations with Al Qaeda. Their main objective is to

overthrow the government of Pakistan and reclaim the power in a state that

they will enforce a strict interpretation of Sharia

8 They believe that Islam must be cleansed before it can be successful in jihad 9 big or small part 10 Combined with violent attacks against Europe and USA 11 Other clashes such as the control of some specific rich areas and generally issues around the wealth seem to effect

this relationship in a large scale. 12 1996-2001





• FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia): It

consists of an army of peasants. This terrorist organization13 defines itself as

a rural, revolutionary, anti-imperialist organization of Bolivian inspiration.

They claim to represent the poor peasants against the interests of the higher

and wealthier classes of Colombia, whilst they are also opposed to the US

influence in Colombia. It is believed that they are among the richest rebel

movements in the entire world14. The organization stopped its fight against the

government of Colombia after both sides signed a revised peace deal on 24th

of November15

Historical background and legal instruments

13 For some countries it is not considered as a terrorist organization 14 http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-36605769 15 It was ratified by the Congress of Colombia on 30th of November, so the fight and the war is officially over



http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-36605769



War, is an ancient “activity” used by many countries and leaders in order to achieve their

pretensions. There has been a lot of theoretical analysis regarding that phenomenon and today’s

scholars and analysts seem to divide it in to two categories. The first is characterized as classical

warfare and the second as modern warfare. The difference between those two is the technological

level and the changes that brought to war. In classical theory16 (classical war) the assets that were

used were restricted to hand to hand weapons(swords, axes) or at the best case the ballistic (arrows

and bows), whilst in the modern theory the revolutionary invention of gunpowder changed

completely the entire game. This transition to the modern warfare17 resulted to a larger scale of

victims and made the atrocities easier. What has to be mentioned, is that besides that, this change,

alternated the main players of the game. To be more specific, the players in the classical warfare

were mainly the states18, while in the modern one (at least at the last 30 years mainly) one new

character made its appearance. This character, is the intra-state player who no longer seeks

expansion as this is described by the theory of neo-neo realism19 but in the name of some

ideological goals (mainly religious or anti-western), that will lead to his global/regional/local

dominance. The aims of the intra-state players are most often accomplished through violence

against the legal authorities, massacres against those who are believed to be against their beliefs

and propaganda towards the uneducated.

Nowadays, the main intra-state players are the terrorist organizations20 who seek only one

thing, the dominance against their opponents. They seem to possess an extremely large amount of

wealth that comes either from the zones they conquer21 or from donors from some people or some

states that benefit from helping them. What is more, they seem to have a privileged access to the

16 Brian Campbell (Editor), Lawrence A. Tritle, The Oxford Handbook of Warfare in the Classical World (Oxford

Handbooks) , Oxford University Press, 2013 17 George Kassimeris,John D. Buckley, The Ashgate Research Companion to Modern Warfare, Ashgate 2010 18 Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Waveland Press, 2010 19 Mearsheimer, JJ , The tragedy of great power politics, New York, W. W. Norton & Company , 2001 20 Edward Newman, Understanding Civil Wars: Continuity and change in intrastate conflict, Routledge, 2014 21 Mainly zones full of petroleum





black market where they can sell the petrol they produce or buy extremely fatal weapons such as

nuclears, biological, radioactive guns etc. Concerning their weaponry, they possess a lot of semi-

modern equipment and continue on buying guns of latest technology from the black market

suppliers. For example regarding their semi-modern equipment, ISIS, has laid claim to many Iraqi

stocks of Soviet/Chinese/American originated equipment.

The UN General Assembly adopted the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy22 This

strategy consists a unique global instrument in order to enhance the national, regional and

international efforts to counter terrorism.

Through its adoption, all Member States have agreed to take practical steps individually

and collectively to prevent and combat terrorism in all of its forms. Those practical steps include

a wide array of measures ranging from strengthening state capacity to counter terrorist threats to

better coordinating United Nations system’s counter-terrorism activities23. It consists of four

pillars

1. Addressing the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism24

2. Measures to prevent and combat terrorism

3. Measures to build states’ capacity to prevent and combat terrorism and to

strengthen the role of the United Nations system in that regard;

4. Measures to ensure respect for human rights for all and the rule of law as

the fundamental basis for the fight against terrorism.

22 8/9/2016 23 https://www.un.org/counterterrorism/ctitf/en/un-global-counter-terrorism-strategy



https://www.un.org/counterterrorism/ctitf/en/un-global-counter-terrorism-strategy



Current situation and issues

At the moment, most of the countries globally are trying to combat terrorism with all their

efforts, using mainly their hard power25 and aiming their attacks against the highest rank terrorist

officials26. The latter seems to be highly ineffective. Although high officials or maybe the leaders

of some terrorist organizations were killed, the organizations survived and became harsher and

crueler swearing revenge against the west. The bombing attempts had better results, especially

when they were combined and of higher frequency. The terror inside the hearts of the political

leaders and their citizens remain, though. The recent attacks in Bataclan and in Berlin testament

that the governments have to take extra measures in order to protect their people. But the whole

situation is like a boomerang. The western forces try to hit hard the terrorists in Africa and Middle

East, but they seem to receive “brutal answers” with more violence.

The word disarm as an idea, though, seems to differ amongst the high politics of the

states27. Most of them believe that a terrorist organization can be eliminated like a virus by fighting

it with painkillers and antibiotics. They don’t try to find the reason under which this virus has

begun its actions and how it came into existence and as a result, they can’t or they don’t want to

find the root of the problem and cure it once and for all.

25 that concerns mainly the big powers 26 26 Mearsheimer, JJ , The tragedy of great power politics, New York, W. W. Norton & Company , 2001 27 Mario Telò , International Relations: A European Perspective, 2016





It is evident that the terrorist organizations rely mainly on petrol and money and secondly

on their weaponry28. Without wealth, they will not be able to conserve many of their heavy

weapons (tanks). Also, they are exploiting the fact that the petrol’s price is high enough, all these

years, something which results in bigger profits. Lower petrol price is equal to lower profit from

the side of the terrorists and lower profit is equal to the dysfunctionality of their own entity. Last

but not least most of the people that have sworn their faith to such extreme organizations, are

people(many children among them) who lack the basic staff of education and are constantly

exposed to a propaganda of hate. Finding ways to break this cloud of this disinformation by

exploiting the technological abilities (internet, satellites) can be a very good method of gradually

dropping the percentage of the people who devote faith to them. What is more, careful actions

towards the limitation of the action of some “popular” black markets can be very vital29. Finally,

political pressure (if the donors are political persons or countries) towards the ones who contribute

funds is very crucial.

In general terms, the terrorist disarm can happen through multiple ways, but the goal is to

strategically and periodically lower the power of those groups. It is something that requires unity,

patience, collaboration and time. Something that requires smart and careful moves.

Points to be addressed

1. How can the terrorist organizations be effectively disarmed?

28 Richard N. Dralonge, Economics and Geopolitics of the Middle East, Nova Publishers, 2008 29 a higher spying level seems to be an effective way





2. How can the threat of terrorism be alleviated?

3. Is it necessary and useful to overhaul and review the current treaties such as the the Global

Counter-Terrorism Strategy?

4. How should cooperation be forwarded towards common measures?

5. How can we restrain the financial profits of terrorism?

6. Soft over hard power, against terrorism, the opposite, or a combination of those?

Useful maps





Bibliography

Kenneth N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, Waveland Press, 2010

Man, the State, and War: A Theoretical Analysis Revised Edition, Columbia University Press,

2001

Brian Blakemore, Imran Awan, Extremism, Counter-terrorism and Policing, Routledge 2016

Campbell (Editor), Lawrence A. Tritle, The Oxford Handbook of Warfare in the Classical World

(Oxford Handbooks) , Oxford University Press, 2013

George Kassimeris,John D. Buckley, The Ashgate Research Companion to Modern Warfare,

Ashgate 2010





Mearsheimer, JJ , The tragedy of great power politics, New York, W. W. Norton & Company ,

2001

Edward Newman, Understanding Civil Wars: Continuity and change in intrastate conflict,

Routledge, 2014

Richard N. Dralonge, Economics and Geopolitics of the Middle East, Nova Publishers, 2008

Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Armaments, Disarmament and

International Security, Oxford University Press 2008

https://www.un.org/disarmament/publications/yearbook/

http://www.un.org/news/dh/infocus/terrorism/sg%20high-level%20panel%20report-

terrorism.htm




http://europe.newsweek.com/isiss-enemy-list-10-reasons-islamic-state-doomed-268953?rm=eu

http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/58058-isis-main-enemy.html

http://www.cbc.ca/news2/interactives/isis-allies-enemies/interactive.html

http://www.businessinsider.com/difference-between-isis-and-al-qaeda-2015-5

https://www.un.org/sc/ctc/focus-areas/financing-of-terrorism/

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-11451718



https://www.un.org/disarmament/publications/yearbook/






http://europe.newsweek.com/isiss-enemy-list-10-reasons-islamic-state-doomed-268953?rm=eu

http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/58058-isis-main-enemy.html

http://www.cbc.ca/news2/interactives/isis-allies-enemies/interactive.html

http://www.businessinsider.com/difference-between-isis-and-al-qaeda-2015-5

https://www.un.org/sc/ctc/focus-areas/financing-of-terrorism/

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-south-asia-11451718

disec study guide topic 2 - bismun conference...

Documents