The UN's Counterterrorism Opportunity
By Michael Jacobson
A piece I wrote for the Guardian Online on the Council of Europe's latest report on the UN and EU terrorist blacklists.
In mid-November, the Council of Europe -- the author of last summer's highly critical report on alleged US secret prisons in Europe -- issued its latest assessment of global counterterrorism efforts. This time, the council took aim at the terrorist lists maintained by the UN and the EU, charging that these blacklists are "totally arbitrary" and "violate the fundamental principles of human rights and rule of law." The council's criticism of the UN comes at a time when its terrorist list -- and the UN itself -- is seriously slipping in its counterterrorism effectiveness and reach. Reversing this trend would be an important step in countering an increasingly revitalised al-Qaida.
For the first few years after 9/11, the UN was at the centre of the fight against terrorism. Its terrorist blacklist -- better known as the "1267 list" after the resolution establishing it -- was a particularly important part of the international efforts against al-Qaida. The 1267 list represented the first time that the international community had reached a consensus on who was a terrorist, paving the way for joint action against al-Qaida in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. This was in sharp contrast to the traditionally paralysing debates at the UN about terrorists versus "freedom fighters".
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