Executive director of the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate at the UN Michele Coninsx affirmed that Qatar is showing the international community that it is an active player in supporting global efforts to identify solutions to the challenge of combating extremism and terrorism.
In an interview with a local newspaper on the sidelines of the International Conference on Studying the Causes of Extremism, Coninsx said that the conference focuses on the motives of extremism and discusses the causes of the phenomenon and ways to deal with it.
“The fight against terrorism is closely linked to collective efforts at the global level, which made it effective and crucial to address the threats posed by terrorism,” Al-Sharq quoted her as saying.
Coninsx called on the international community to work together and to bring the terrorists to justice through legal procedures, stressing that terrorism and violent extremism can never be defeated by military means alone.
She added that there are other factors that can address the phenomenon, including addressing the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism, preventing extremism and terrorism, combating incitement to commit terrorist acts, respecting human rights and fundamental freedoms, promoting political and religious tolerance, good governance, economic development and social cohesion.
Coninsx noted that the involvement and exchange of information and lessons learned on the motives of extremism is important for member states given the complexity of this challenge and the fact that the motives of extremism may vary from country to country and region to region.
On the issues and themes of the conference, Coninsx said that the topics under discussion were relevant to the current development of the global terrorist threat, including the challenges posed by the return of foreign terrorist fighters and returnees from conflict zones to their countries, in particular, the way in which the causes of extremism work helps feed many of the current threats.
“The conference's focus on the motives of extremism is relevant to our collective efforts to effectively counter the threats posed by terrorism, including the return of foreign terrorist fighters,” she noted.
The UN official stressed that understanding, discovering and addressing the drivers of extremism in violence is a critical element in this response and on this basis.
The two-day International Conference on Studying the Causes of Extremism began on Saturday and is being organised by Qatar University's Social and Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI) in the presence of international experts, scientists and decision-makers from 20 countries around the world. (QNA)
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