New York, 2 August 2017
CTED at the United Nations Security Council, United Nations, New York, August 2, 2017. Photo courtesy of UN DPI/John Gillespie.
The Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) today welcomed the Security Council’s adoption of resolution 2370 (2017), which calls on UN Member States to take a range of measures to eliminate the supply of weapons to terrorists.
Addressing a briefing of the Council prior to the resolution’s adoption, Mr. Weixiong Chen, CTED Acting Executive Director, described both the briefing and the adoption of the resolution as “significant and necessary”.
Mr. Chen recalled the role of CTED to support the policy responses of the Counter Terrorism Committee (CTC) and the Council on a broad range of counter-terrorism issues.
With respect to denying terrorists access to weapons, CTED’s assessment and analysis of Member States’ counter-terrorism capacities had revealed a wide range of vulnerabilities and concerns.
They included poor stockpile management, as well as shortcomings in measures to monitor the production, control, sale, brokerage, export and import of small arms and light weapons.
Increased trafficking of weapons via the Internet was also a major concern.
Mr. Chen stressed that cooperation with other UN entities and international and regional organizations was essential to CTED’s work.
CTED participated in a range of initiatives aimed at strengthening Member States’ capacities to prevent terrorist access to weapons. It had recently signed a formal cooperation agreement with INTERPOL that would enable the two entities to deepen their cooperation in denying terrorists access to weapons.
Mr. Chen told the Council that the country visits conducted by CTED on behalf of the CTC remained a critical tool, which enabled CTED to assess Member States’ overall national counter-terrorism efforts and their specific achievements, strengths, weaknesses and technical assistance needs, as well as to identify and promote good practices and facilitate the delivery of technical assistance together with its implementing partners.
CTED monitors, promotes and facilitates Member States’ implementation of Council resolutions on terrorism through assessment; analysis; and the identification of trends, challenges, gaps and good practices.
The Security Council has repeatedly stressed the importance of preventing terrorists’ access to weapons, including in its resolutions 1373 (2001), 2178 (2014), 2195 (2014), 2220 (2015), 2253 (2015), 2309 (2016), 2322 (2016) and 2341 (2017).
The Council briefing was held under the agenda item “Threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts”. Representatives of the United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism, UNODC and INTERPOL also attended.
Under the Presidency of Egypt, the CTC, with the support of CTED, arranged an open experts’ briefing on a similar topic in May 2017 to pave the way for the discussion and adoption of Council resolution 2370 (2017).