Roundup: Africa warns spillover of terrorism with return of foreign IS fighters
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E-mail Xinhua, October 24, 2017
ALGIERS, Oct. 23 (Xinhua) -- Algeria on Monday warned that terrorist threat that target the Sahel and the Corn of Africa region would expand to other regions amid poor living conditions and the return of foreign fighters to Africa.
This warning was uttered at the first meeting of the Global Counterterrorism Forum's Capacity-building in the West Africa Region Working Group, which kicked off on Monday in the Algerian capital of Algiers.
In his opening remarks, Algerian Foreign Minister, Abdelkader Messahel said the international community is mobilizing major means to eradicate the terrorist threat all over the world.
The Algerian Foreign Minister outlined the main terrorist relating challenges that faces the region, in addition to ways and means to counter them.
He mentioned, for instance, the risk of the return of foreign terrorist fighters to the African Sahel after the losses inflicted by international coalition to the terrorist group of Daesh in Syria and Iraq.
Messahel suggested reinforcing border security cooperation, and improve living conditions of regions' population, including youngsters, to deter them from joining terror fiefs in exchange of money.
He further underlined the importance to dry financial sources for terrorist groups, including ransom payment, as well as drug and arms trafficking, which provide huge sums of money to these groups, making them more powerful.
Co-chaired by Algeria and Canada, the Working Group of Capacity-building in the West Africa Region promotes regional and international cooperation and discuss capacity-building gaps specific to the African Sahel region and identifying solutions.
This two-day meeting is also attended by international and regional organizations, including the United Nations, the African Union and the European Union.
It precedes first regional meeting of the Global Counterterrorism Forum due Wednesday in Algiers, as it will discuss the relationship between transnational organized crime and terrorism.
This meeting was also an opportunity to observe one minute's silence for Nigerien and U.S. soldiers killed recently in terrorist attack in Niger.
Algeria is a founding member of the Global Counterterrorism Forum, and has already hosted expert-level meetings in 2016 to discuss topics related to the role of criminal justice in the fight against terrorism in the Sahel, and the role of democracy in countering and combating violent extremism and terrorism.
Experts say Africa, like many other regions of the world, is the target of ongoing terrorist threat after that this trans-border scourge managed to "exploit human misery in some areas, and penetrate social media platforms via Internet to recruit young people in Africa."
These developments urged African heads of state and government to establish a coordination mission to prevent and combat terrorism in Africa under the supervision of the African Union. Enditem
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