The important role of parliamentarians in the fight against terrorism was highlighted by the Secretary General of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean (PAM), Ambassador Sergio Piazzi, at the OSCE Conference on Counterterrorism, held in Rome on 10-11 May 2018.
The event brought together top global and national level experts mandated to combat the threat of terrorism from the 57 OSCE participating states, including from four PAM MENA countries.
Amb. Piazzi addressed the conference during the first session dedicated to international cooperation. The PAM Secretary General underscored the need to adopt harmoniously UN Security Council resolutions into national legislations across countries in order to facilitate international cooperation to counter this threat. He further highlighted the ongoing cooperation between PAM the UN and the EU on strengthening the legal frameworks to combat the phenomenon of foreign fighters and radicalization.
To sustain its work with the UN, PAM will also organize, jointly with the Pan-African parliament, a large parliamentary conference hosted by the Parliament of Turkey next November, looking at the legislative strategies and policies of mass migrations, security and terrorism, as these are issues, which are interconnected and are of critical importance to the Euro-Mediterranean and the Sahel regions. The national parliaments of the CIS region will be invited to attend.
The meeting in Rome focused on the latest evolution of the terrorist threat, which is posed by returning foreign fighters who survived the military and territorial losses suffered by ISIS and similar groups on the battlefields of Syria, Libya and Iraq.
Enhanced information-sharing, border security, ongoing cyber recruitment and propaganda, human rights-compliant rehabilitation and reintegration programmes were highlighted as the key measures needed to address the return or relocation of the foreign fighters and their families.
The conference represented an excellent opportunity for bilateral meetings with national, UN and EU counterparts, as well as representatives of the Italian and Norwegian parliaments.