The fight against terrorism in the European Union

The articulation of the fight against terrorism
The European strategy in the fight against terrorism
The European list of persons and entities involved in terrorist acts

The European Union has two working groups focussing on terrorism:
 the Terrorism group (third pillar) has a technical operational vocation (exchange of police techniques, definition of best practices, etc.);
 the Coter (second pillar) is a diplomatic forum that deals with the issue of terrorism from a political standpoint.

In addition, several European bodies have jurisdiction in the area of the fight against terrorism, such as the Sitcen (threat analysis), Europol (European police office), Eurojust (international judicial cooperation and coordination of investigations and proceedings) and the Counter-Terrorist Group of the Club of Berne, which brings together the national security services of 19 countries.

Finally, following the 2004 Madrid attacks, the EU now has a coordinator for the fight against terrorism.

The attacks in Madrid (2004) and London (2005), the plans foiled during the summer of 2006 (in Germany, the United Kingdom and Denmark), and the failed attacks in London and Glasgow in 2007 have shown that the territory of the European Union was a target for groups linked to Islamist-inspired international terrorism - the al-Qaeda influence.

In order to cope with this threat, in 2005 the EU adopted a European strategy aiming to “fight against terrorism, while respecting human rights, and to make Europe safer, by allowing its citizens to live in a space of freedom, safety and justice”. The EU’s strategy is structured around four principles: prevention, protection, pursuit and reaction.

Resolution 1373 of the United Nations Security Council stresses the fight against financing terrorism and introduces a general obligation to freeze the assets and economic resources of persons and entities that have committed or have been complicit in terrorist acts. Unlike resolution 1267 (which concerns exclusively the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the persons and groups associated with them), this text does not make provision for the Security Council to establish a list and asks the States to take their own actions to freeze the assets and resources of terrorists and terrorist entities individually.

The European Union decided to apply this resolution collectively and, on 27 December 2001, adopted the necessary legal instruments (joint positions 930 and 931/01 and Community regulation 2580/01). The European list differs from the UN 1267 list in:
 the nature of the sanctions (assets are frozen on the territory of EU Member States);
 its scope (persons, groups and entities not linked to al-Qaeda and the Taliban).

^{Updated on February 2010}