WORKING MEETINGS SUMMIT2006

Strategy for partnerships between states and business to counter terrorism

30-11-2006

Approved by Global Forum for Partnerships between States and Businesses to Counter Terrorism, Moscow, November 30, 2006

1. Terrorism is one of the greatest threats to civilization today. It destroys life, divides peo-ples, fosters conflict, weakens economies and undermines progress. It can never be justified. Just as governments and businesses co-operate to build prosperity, so they should also combine their efforts to counter terrorism. Such partnerships should be voluntary, made in a spirit of cooperation and will be based on the respective roles, responsibilities and interests of the partners.

2. This Global Forum strongly condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations regardless of when and where terrorist acts are committed or who commits them, expresses deep sympathy to the victims of the terrorist acts and their families, and acknowledges the important contribution of the United Nations and other international organizations to the prevention and countering of terrorism.

3. We must reduce both the threat of terrorism and our vulnerability to it. To reduce the threat, we need to prevent terrorist acts and disrupt terrorist activities now and to prevent new generations of terrorists. To reduce our vulnerability, we need to protect our societies against terrorist attack and minimize the consequences of attacks. However, this cannot be done by States alone. Rather, it requires joint efforts between governments, businesses and the whole of civil society.

4. This Global Forum therefore seeks to encourage and develop worldwide cooperation to promote partnerships between governments and businesses, to contribute to ensure the stability and security of economies and societies around the world. Through mutual and effective sharing of information, knowledge and experience and through joint or coordinated actions, governments and businesses can develop, improve and implement measures to prevent and counter terrorism. These partnerships are of great value in a broad range of sectors and we will demonstrate below how this Global Forum views the parameters of such partnerships in combating terrorism.

Business and Government leadership in counter terrorism

5. Financial sector: Close cooperation between businesses and governments enables the identification of the financial flows, which support terrorism. By improving the quality and mecha-nisms for exchanging relevant information between governments and businesses, we can en-hance these efforts and methods to counter the financing of terrorism. This in turn enables us not only to freeze or otherwise disrupt financial support to terrorism, but also to prevent the use of business structures and individual enterprises for terrorist purposes and to gain intelligence about terrorists' plans, activities and connections. Through cooperation in countering terrorism, governments and businesses can better ensure the stability and security of the international financial system. By jointly assessing and sharing information on terrorist risks faced by the financial system, where appropriate, we can better protect the integrity of the financial sector, including by identifying risks linked to terrorism and working out effective schemes of insurance against such risks, as appropriate. Measures developed by the international community, notably the FATF, are of utmost importance in this context.

6. Telecommunications and Information security: To reduce vulnerability of critical information systems to electronic attack by terrorists, governments and businesses should work together to develop and improve arrangements and methods, and ensure that best practices are promoted. Increased cooperation would also allow information and alerts to be efficiently shared between relevant actors, and ensure that any response to an electronic attack is swift and co-ordinated. While collection of data from terrorist use of telecommunications and the Internet can be invaluable to police and intelligence services, it can also threaten the privacy of individual law-abiding citizens. Governments and businesses should work closely to ensure that proper lawful procedures are followed concerning the collection, retaining and handling of such data.

7. Internet: Internet service providers and other businesses can work with governments to counter the misuse of the Internet by terrorists and to prevent the facilitation of the final steps from extremism to terrorism. For example, terrorists have used the Internet with the aim to recruit and to instruct people on how to mount attacks and to incite them to commit terrorist acts. Governments should therefore, as appropriate, look at building closer voluntary national and international partnerships with Internet service providers to tackle such abuses.

8. Tourism: The tourism industry in some regions is a priority target for terrorists and should be protected through joint efforts of governments and businesses involved, including through appropriate and timely exchange of information about potential terrorist threats to specific regions and tourist destinations.

9. Critical infrastructure must be preserved and protected. Attacks on energy, communications, chemical and other hazardous industries, food, water, educational institutions and health-care sectors could seriously threaten health and safety and disrupt supply and economic activity. Some sectors, such as energy and chemicals, could themselves be exploited by terrorists to threaten the broader community. To ensure protection against terrorism, it is vital that govern-ments and businesses active in these sectors cooperate effectively, including through intense exchange of information and expertise. Some regulation may be reasonable to ensure a sufficient level of protective security in the interest of all. However, in many cases the best result is achieved by voluntary co-operation, such as through joint simulations and exercises. When protecting critical infrastructures against terrorism, other threats and risks should also be taken into consideration in order to assure rational and effective protection [all hazards approach].

10. Transportation: While there is already extensive co-operation between governments and airlines on international and domestic aviation security, there is still room to deepen and broaden this cooperation, for example regarding illegal air transport of small arms and light weap-ons (SALWs) and their munitions. Moreover, there remains great potential to develop joint coop-erative work on maritime, rail and other ground transport security issues between governments and businesses to improve safety and preparedness.

11. International Trade Supply Chain: Co-operation between governments and businesses is vital to lessening the vulnerability of the international trade supply chain to terrorist attacks. Partnerships between the public and business sector could provide trade facilitation benefits to participating businesses in exchange for meeting minimum security criteria. Governments should encourage Customs-Business partnerships to promote supply chain security based on existing international standards and best practices.

Emergency Preparedness and Consequence Management

12. Threat assessments: Joint assessment of terrorist threats and the effective dissemination of such information, including to the public and to businesses, helps those actors make sensible decisions about security and preparedness.

13. Consequence management: Governments should work with businesses to encourage and spread best practices on consequence management and business continuity. They can also cooperate to work out ways to improve assistance to victims of terrorist attacks and their families.

14. Emergency response network: While the majority of the emergency response network are in the public sector, businesses can contribute significantly to emergency response. As it is vital that these efforts be well coordinated, joint anti-terrorist exercises should be conducted whenever possible.

Critical linkages

15. Economic development: Businesses can contribute to fostering economic development by providing jobs and improved access to goods and services to underserved and underdeveloped communities.

16. Charitable sector: Businesses and governments should work together to prevent and minimize abuse by terrorists in this sector, while preserving the legitimate rights and activities of these organizations. This is best achieved through close co-operation between authorities and other competent bodies and charities, as well as through enhanced public transparency regarding sources and disposition of charitable funds. Public bodies can also provide training and guidance to help charities protect themselves against terrorist abuse.

17. Academic sector: The academic and commercial scientific communities have key roles to play in developing and implementing new technology to enhance protective security, but also in conducting research on terrorism-related issues, including structural and other factors that can encourage radicalization and terrorist recruitment. Governments should encourage joint, individual or coordinated scientific research with academic communities and businesses on terrorism-related issues. Governments and businesses can also promote moderation, tolerance and social inclusion through educational and other exchange programs.

18. Media can play a major role in promoting moderation, tolerance, social inclusion, and in isolating terrorists, by fostering open and well-informed debate and by countering the motivational factors, which promote extremism - conflict, propaganda, prejudice. At the same time, governments should ensure that their counter-terrorism efforts are understood by the media and the general public.

* * *

19. The more governments and businesses work together at national and international levels to help build these partnerships, the stronger and more effective they will be. To this end, we will contribute to establishing informal international government-business working groups on counter-terrorism partnerships in key sectors. Within the framework of a number of preparatory working meetings several specific proposals for antiterrorist partnerships between states and businesses to counter terrorism have already been presented. On the basis of the discussions held at this Forum, these informal international government-business working groups will seek to work out and put into practice proposals and concrete projects of cooperation between states and businesses to counter terrorism. Interested state and private structures, as well as relevant or specialized international organizations, as appropriate, will take part in the elaboration and implementation of these proposals and projects on a voluntary basis. The working groups will report the results of their deliberations to a second meeting of this Forum.