By Mohammed Abu-Nimer

The emergence of “violent extremism” (VE)2 as a central framework and priority adopted by most Western and non-Western government agencies. It has become the primary lens through which to describe many of their activities, especially in conflict areas around the world, even when the issues are not or are only remotely related. There is no doubt that VE narratives, especially those promoting violence in the name of Islam spread by groups such as Al-Qaeda, Al-Shabab, Taliban and Daesh, have gained strength and visibility in the last two decades (regardless of the differences in the groups’ motivation or type of justification – be it nationalism, anti-Western intervention or religion). However, it is an overstatement to solely explain the motivation for endorsing or adopting VE in Muslim societies as a result of theological factors; as explained below, there are many other factors besides religious identity and theological reasoning contributing to the phenomenon. Nevertheless, it is possible to trace historical factors that led to the creation of such groups in predominantly Muslim countries. In Afghanistan, for example, one such factor is rooted in the Cold War dynamics between the United States (US) and the USSR at the time of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. To fight communism, the US government mobilised local Afghan communities, which included some fighters who subsequently employed extreme Islamic religious narratives. The US’s fervent desire to prevent the spread of communism thus led to the arming of members of Afghan society who later utilised the concept of jihad against non-believers in certain Sunni interpretations.

Berlin: Berghof Foundation, 2018. 21p.

Edited by Beatrix Austin and Hans J. Giessmann

Is the topic of violent extremism slowly turning into one on which everything has already been said, but not yet by everyone, as Karl Valentin used to wryly remark? We do not think so. While violent extremism (VE) has indeed emerged as a new buzzword and a strong funding trend over the past few years, effective strategies for addressing the phenomenon are still being forged and need to be reviewed and tested. Violent extremism’s manifestations range widely: from foreign fighters via terrorist attacks to increasingly public violence-condoning ideology and rhetoric of both secular and religious provenance. How to deal with violent extremism, and its protagonists, is therefore also becoming a major challenge for peacebuilders and conflict transformation practitioners. What specific advantages can a “transformative lens” bring – one which applies insights and learning from the peacebuilding and conflict transformation fields?

Berlin: Berghof Foundation, 2019. 98p.

By Vidhya Ramalingam

Far-right extremism remains a worrying problem across Europe. The most visible cases are those that hit the headlines, such as the discovery of the National Socialist Underground in Germany or Anders Behring Breivik’s attacks in Norway. In the past decade, both Hungary and Sweden were hit by a string of serial murders of Roma and ethnic minorities. Though attacks of this magnitude and scale remain rare, they are not unheard of. In some cases, those personally touched by these violent attacks are still fighting for justice. While high-profile and high-impact events hit the headlines, the bulk of the threat posed by the far right is felt through smaller-scale localised harassment, bullying and hate crime by extremists targeting minority communities. These kinds of incidences often go undetected, and indeed they are hard to quantify. They manifest in the sectioning off of some local areas as no-go zones for ethnic minorities, graffiti of far-right symbols on mosques and synagogues, or threats received by individual members of the community. Those carrying out these actions – far-right extremists – are a broad group, ranging from less ideological youth street gangs to neo-Nazi terrorist cells, anti-Islam activists and registered political parties. Though they differ in their aims and methods, there are some defining features: racism, xenophobia, ultra-nationalism and authoritarianism.

London: Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 2014. 77p.

By F. Cilluffo, G.B. Saathoff, et. al

Savvy use of the Internet has empowered terror networks to expand their reach beyond national borders by enabling wide distribution of a compelling message and social connectivity with new audiences. Use of computer-mediated communication (CMC) has made a range of terrorist operational activities cheaper, faster, and more secure, including communications, fundraising, planning and coordination, training, information gathering and data mining, propaganda and misinformation dissemination, and radicalization and recruitment. The list is long, and not even complete. Before the Internet, terrorists seeking to communicate with one another through electronic means used telephones or radios, which could be tapped. Terrorists seeking to offer training meant congregating trainers and trainees in a fixed training location, exposing the group to capture or worse. Terrorists or their supporters engaged in fundraising or recruitment often pursued these aims in public settings. And terrorists researching a potential target often did so at public libraries and bookstores, subjecting them to surveillance in these public spaces. Now, with the Internet, all of these same activities can be conducted in relative anonymity from safe locations across the globe.

Washington, DC: Homeland Security Policy Institute, The George Washington University; Charlottesville, VA: The Critical Incident Analysis Group (CIAG) University of Virginia School of Medicine, 2007. 34p.

By Brian Michael Jenkins

The U.S. homeland faces a multilayered threat from terrorist organizations. Homegrown jihadists account for most of the terrorist activity in the United States since 9/11. Efforts by jihadist terrorist organizations to inspire terrorist attacks in the United States have thus far yielded meager results. No American jihadist group has emerged to sustain a terrorist campaign, and there is no evidence of an active jihadist underground to support a continuing terrorist holy war. The United States has invested significant resources in preventing terrorist attacks, and authorities have been able to uncover and thwart most of the terrorist plots. This Perspective identifies 86 plots to carry out terrorist attacks and 22 actual attacks since 9/11 involving 178 planners and perpetrators. Eighty-seven percent of those planners and perpetrators had long residencies in the United States. Only four of them had come to the United States illegally, all as minors. Nationality is a poor predictor of later terrorist activity, and vetting people coming to the United States, no matter how rigorous, cannot identify those who radicalize here. Determining whether a young teenager might, more than 12 years later, turn out to be a jihadist terrorist would require the bureaucratic equivalent of divine foresight.

Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 2017. 98p.

By Jerome P. Bjelopera

The emphasis of counterterrorism policy in the United States since Al Qaeda’s attacks of September 11, 2001 (9/11) has been on jihadist terrorism. However, in the last decade, domestic terrorists—people who commit crimes within the homeland and draw inspiration from U.S.-based extremist ideologies and movements—have killed American citizens and damaged property across the country. Not all of these criminals have been prosecuted under federal terrorism statutes, which does not imply that domestic terrorists are taken any less seriously than other terrorists. The Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) do not officially designate domestic terrorist organizations, but they have openly delineated domestic terrorist “threats.” These include individuals who commit crimes in the name of ideologies supporting animal rights, environmental rights, anarchism, white supremacy, anti-government ideals, black separatism, and beliefs about abortion

Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 2017. 62p.

By Philip Alpers

In New Zealand, 250,000 licensed shooters own an estimated 1.1 million firearms, enough for one in each occupied dwelling and sufficient to outnumber the combined small-arms of the police and armed forces by a ratio of 30 to 1. We own 16 times as many guns per capita as the English and the Welsh, 60% more than the Australians but less than half as many as the residents of the United States. An additional 14,000 guns are imported to New Zealand in a typical year. Each day an average of seven firearm offences involving danger to life are reported to the police, while one in five homicides are committed with a firearm. On average, one person dies by gunshot in New Zealand every four days. Despite a common certainty that firearms are increasingly misused, there has been little local research. Although critical data on the misuse of firearms are collected by police, these are not made available.

Wellington NZ: New Zealand Police Association, 1996. 33p.

By James Silver; Andre Simons; and Sarah Craun

"In 2017 there were 30 separate active shootings in the United States, the largest number ever recorded by the FBI during a one-year period. With so many attacks occurring, it can become easy to believe that nothing can stop an active shooter determined to commit violence. [...] Faced with so many tragedies, society routinely wrestles with a fundamental question: can anything be done to prevent attacks on our loved ones, our children, our schools, our churches, concerts, and communities? There is cause for hope because there is something that can be done. In the weeks and months before an attack, many active shooters engage in behaviors that may signal impending violence. While some of these behaviors are intentionally concealed, others are observable and -- if recognized and reported -- may lead to a disruption prior to an attack. Unfortunately, well-meaning bystanders (often friends and family members of the active shooter) may struggle to appropriately categorize the observed behavior as malevolent. [...] Once reported to law enforcement, those in authority may also struggle to decide how best to assess and intervene, particularly if no crime has yet been committed. By articulating the concrete, observable pre-attack behaviors of many active shooters, the FBI hopes to make these warning signs more visible and easily identifiable. This information is intended to be used not only by law enforcement officials, mental health care practitioners, and threat assessment professionals, but also by parents, friends, teachers, employers and anyone who suspects that a person is moving towards violence."

Washington, DC: U.S.. Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2018. 30p.

By Columbine Review Commission

The Commission conducted 15 meetings open to members of the public. The Commission received statements from an extensive list of State and local officials and private persons who had experience with or information concerning the event; Commission staff reviewed thousands of pages of official and unofficial documents, reports, and studies. Two recommendations related to crisis response actions. First, law enforcement policy and training should emphasize that the highest priority of law enforcement officers, after arriving at the scene of a crisis, is to stop any ongoing assault. Second, there should be an increased emphasis on training appropriate personnel in preparation for and responding to large-scale emergencies. Two recommendations pertained to improved communications for critical emergencies. First, law enforcement agencies should plan their communications systems to facilitate crisis communication with other agencies with whom they might reasonably be expected to interface in emergencies. Second, Colorado should continue to develop a single statewide digital trunked communications system. Other categories of recommendations pertained to advance planning for critical emergencies; interaction with media representatives; tasks of school resource officers; detection by school administrators of potential perpetrators of school-based violence and administrative countermeasures; medical treatment for attack victims; reuniting attack victims and their families; identification of victims' bodies and family access to bodies; and suicide prevention in the aftermath of traumatic incidents.

Denver, Colo. : Columbine Review Commission, 2001. 174p.

By The Office of the Child Advocate

In January, 2013, the Office of the Child Advocate was directed by the Connecticut Child Fatality Review Panel to prepare a report that would focus on Adam Lanza (hereinafter referred to as AL), and include a review of the circumstances that pre-dated his commission of mass murder at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The charge was to develop any recommendations for public health system improvement that emanated from the review. Authors of this report focused on AL’s developmental, educational, and mental health profile over time, the services he received from various community providers, and ultimately his condition prior to his actions on December 14, 2012. Authors looked for any warning signs, red flags, or other lessons that could be learned from a review of AL’s life. It was not the primary purpose of this investigation to explicitly examine the role of guns in the Sandy Hook shootings. However, the conclusion cannot be avoided that access to guns is relevant to an examination of ways to improve the public health. Access to assault weapons with high capacity magazines did play a major role in this and other mass shootings in recent history. Our emphasis on AL’s developmental trajectory and issues of mental illness should not be understood to mean that these issues were considered more important than access to these weapons or that we do not consider such access to be a critical public health issue.

Hartford, CT : State of Connecticut, Office of the Child Advocate, 2014. 114p.

By William S. Pollack, William.; Modzeleski, and Rooney, Georgeann

In the wake of several high-profile shootings at schools in the United States, most notably the shootings that occurred at Columbine High School on April 20, 1999, the United States Secret Service (Secret Service) and the United States Department of Education (ED) embarked on a collaborative endeavor to study incidents of planned (or "targeted") violence in the nation's schools. Initiated in 1999, the study, termed the Safe School Initiative (SSI), examined several issues, most notably whether past school-based attacks were planned, and what could be done to prevent future attacks. The SSI findings highlight that in most targeted school-based attacks, individuals, referred to as "bystanders" in this report, had some type of advanced knowledge about planned school violence. Despite this advanced knowledge, the attacks still occurred. This study aimed to further the prevention of targeted school-based attacks by exploring how students with prior knowledge of attacks made decisions regarding what steps, if any, to take after learning the information. The study sought to identify what might be done to encourage more students to share information they learn about potential targeted school-based violence with one or more adults. Six key findings were identified. Given the small sample size and the exploratory nature of the study, generalization from these findings may be limited. The findings are: (1) The relationships between the bystanders and the attackers, as well as when and how the bystanders came upon information about the planned attacks, varied; (2) Bystanders shared information related to a threat along a continuum that ranged from bystanders who took no action to those who actively conveyed the information; (3) School climate affected whether bystanders came forward with information related to the threats; (4) Some bystanders disbelieved that the attacks would occur and thus did not report them; (5) Bystanders often misjudged the likelihood and immediacy of the planned attack; and (6) In some situations, parents and parental figures influenced whether the bystander reported the information related to the potential attack to school staff or other adults in positions of authority,

Washington, DC: United States Secret Service and United States Department of Education, 2008. 15p.

By Alex P. Schmid

Based on an in-depth literature review, Research Fellow Dr. Alex P. Schmid explores the terms “radicalisation”, “de-radicalisation” and “counter-radicalisation” and the discourses surrounding them. Much of the literature on radicalisation focuses on Islamist extremism and jihadist terrorism. This is also reflected in this Research Paper which explores the relationship between radicalisation, extremism and terrorism. Historically, “radicalism” – contrary to “extremism” – does not necessarily have negative connotations, nor is it a synonym for terrorism. Schmid argues that both extremism and radicalism can only be properly assessed in relation to what is mainstream political thought in a given period. The paper further explores what we know well and what we know less well about radicalisation. It proposes to explore radicalisation not only on the micro-level of “vulnerable individuals” but also on the meso-level of the “radical milieu” and the macro-level of “radicalising public opinion and political parties”. The author reconceptualises radicalisation as a process that can occur on both sides of conflict dyads and challenges several widespread assumptions. The final section examines various counter-radicalisation and deradicalisation programmes. It concludes with a series of policy recommendations.

The Hague: International Centre for Counter-Terrorism, 2013. 105p.

Edited by Jan Willem Duyvendak and James M. Jasper.

In this important book, Jan Willem Duyvendak and James M. Jasper bring together an internationally acclaimed group of contributors to demonstrate the complexities of the social and political spheres in various areas of public policy. By breaking down the state into the players who really make decisions and pursue coherent strategies, these essays provide new perspectives on the interactions between political protestors and the many parts of the state—from courts, political parties, and legislators to police, armies, and intelligence services. By analyzing politics as the interplay of various players within structured arenas, <i>Breaking Down the State</i> provides an innovative look at law and order versus opposition movements in countries across the globe.

Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2015. 246p.

By The Federal Commission on School Safety

Communities across the country are responding to school violence with a number of measures, including assigned school resource officers (SRO). School administrations, law enforcement agencies, families, and community stakeholders are diligently working to protect children and education personnel from school attacks. The National Police Foundation (NPF), in collaboration with the COPS Office, created the Averted School Violence (ASV) database in 2015 as a platform for law enforcement, school staff, and mental health professionals to share information about ASV incidents and lessons learned with the goal of mitigating and ultimately preventing future injuries and fatalities in educational institutions. The database includes school incidents beginning with the Columbine High School attack (1999) and continuing to the present day. The NPF has partnered with stakeholder groups National Association of School Resource Officers (NASRO) and the International Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators (IACLEA) to conduct research and analysis on improving school safety. This report examines a dozen case studies of targeted violence incidents thwarted by the positive and often heroic actions of classmates, school administrators, SROs, and law enforcement agencies. It also includes recommendations and lessons learned from all cases in the ASV database. In addition, a companion publication entitled Targeted Violence Averted: College and University Case Studies presents information on post-secondary averted violence incidents and lessons learned to support student safety.

Washington, DC: Department of Education, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice, 2018. 180p.

By Jeff Allison, Mo Canady, and Frank G. Straub

Tuesday, April 20, 1999, was sadly the last day of school for the seniors of Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. On that day, two 12th-grade students armed with a semiautomatic pistol, two shotguns, and a rifle murdered a teacher and 12 of their fellow students; an additional 21 people were injured by gunfire, and three were injured escaping from the school. The perpetrators took their own lives in the school library where they had killed most of their victims. At the beginning of the attack, one of the shooters exchanged gunfire outside with the school resource officer (SRO). While the Columbine shooting inarguably contributed to the expanded deployment of SROs in schools, it was not the advent of school-based law enforcement in the United States. There are indications in the research literature that Flint, Michigan, assigned a police officer to its schools in 1953, and the Fresno (California) Police Department first assigned plainclothes officers to its elementary and middle schools in 1968 (West and Fries 1995). The Fresno initiative was an attempt to enhance police-community relations specifically with youth. The federal impetus for increasing the number of SROs can be traced in part to the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 as well as the Gun-Free Schools Act of 1994. The Cops in School program, funded by the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS Office), grew out of the former statute. The latter statute was enacted in response to juvenile and gang violence. Soon after the tragedy at Columbine, which at the time was the worst mass casualty shooting at a school in the United States, the U.S. Department of Education (DoED) and the U.S. Secret Service undertook a study of past school shootings to identify factors that might help prevent future targeted school attacks (Vossekuil et al. 2004). The key recommendation from that study was that all schools should establish behavior threat assessment teams. The report recommended that school administrators, law enforcement officers (especially SROs), teachers, and counselors participate in these teams to address concerning behavior by members of the school community.

Washington, DC: Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. 2020. 44p.

By Peter Langman, Anthony Petrosino, and Hannah Sutherland

School shootings are the subject of debate in the media and in communities across the United States, and there is much discussion about prevention and the root causes of such attacks. But what does research say about these tragic events and their perpetrators? Do all shooters fit a specific profile? And what meaningful steps can schools and communities take to reduce the likelihood of these events? In concise, clear language, this research brief, produced by the WestEd Justice & Prevention Research Center, describes and refutes five common misconceptions about school shootings and suggests an evidence-based strategy to reduce the probability of attacks. The authors conclude that schools and communities are better served when presented with a balanced perspective informed by the wealth of available research about perpetrators, their varying motivations, and pre-attack behaviors.

San Francisco, CA: WestEd Justice and Prevention Research Center, 2018. 5p.

By International Crisis Group

Once regarded as a minor hub in Mexico’s criminal economy, Veracruz is now confronting the harrowing truths from over a decade of violence and grand corruption. At least 2,750 people are believed to have disappeared in a state whose former governor is wanted for embezzlement on numerous counts. The murders of seventeen journalists from 2010 onwards are the most notorious examples of a whirlwind of killings that targeted, among others, legal professionals, police officers, potential witnesses to crimes and any civilians who dared check the ambitions of a multitude of criminal organisations and their political accomplices. A new governor from the opposition National Action Party (PAN) has promised to clean out the state and prosecute wrongdoers, fostering hopes that peace can be restored. But as economic turbulence threatens the country, and bankruptcy looms over Veracruz, strong international support will be crucial to bolster initiatives aimed at finding the bodies of the disappeared, investigating past crimes, and transforming the state’s police force and prosecution service. Veracruz is emblematic of the challenges facing the country as a whole. Threats by the new U.S. administration to curb Mexican imports and fortify the border to keep out undocumented immigrants imperils its southern neighbour’s economic prospects. Similarly, President Trump’s predilection for armed force to combat cartels ignores the harm produced by the militarisation of public security as well as its proven ineffectiveness. But Mexican voices demanding a stronger national response are hamstrung by the extreme unpopularity of political leaders and public estrangement from government. Corruption and perceived criminal complicity have undermined the legitimacy of the Mexican government at all levels, especially at the tier of the country’s 31 regional states. Baptised “viceroys” as a result of the extraordinary powers granted them during Mexico’s transition from one-party regime to multiparty democracy, state governors have also become some of the country’s most disreputable public authorities. Since 2010, eleven state governors have come under investigation for corruption. In Veracruz, an alliance between criminal groups and the highest levels of local political power paved the way to an unbridled campaign of violence through the capture of local judicial and security institutions, guaranteeing impunity for both sides. Strengthening institutional probity and capacity in Veracruz, as in the rest of Mexico, will require federal and state levels to deliver on vows to work in partnership to staunch corruption, and on their willingness to abjure short-term political and electoral advantage. With the election of the new governor, Miguel Ángel Yunes Linares, the once hegemonic Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lost power in the state for the first time in over 80 years. But the PRI remains in control at the federal level and has shown wavering commitment to Yunes’ reformist plans, not least because of the importance of securing votes from the region, the country’s third most populous, in the 2018 presidential election. The state’s budgetary crisis and the new governor’s two-year mandate make it highly unlikely that the state government could accomplish sweeping reform to Veracruz’s institutions without sustained federal backing.

Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2017. 41p.

By Anti-Defamation League

Right-wing extremists have been one of the largest and most consistent sources of domestic terror incidents in the United States for many years, a fact that has not gotten the attention it deserves. n The Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism has compiled a list of 150 rightwing terrorist acts, attempted acts, and plots and conspiracies that took place in the United States during the past 25 years (1993-2017). These incidents were perpetrated by white supremacists, anti-government extremists, anti-abortion extremists and other types of right-wing extremists. n The vast majority of right-wing terror incidents have stemmed from white supremacists and anti-government extremists (such as militia groups and sovereign citizens), with the two broad extremist movements being responsible for almost the same number of incidents (64 related to white supremacists, 63 to anti-government extremists). n Most acts were committed by small number of extremists acting on their own rather than at the behest of organized extremist groups. About half of the 150 incidents were actually committed by lone wolf offenders. n Right-wing extremists have killed 255 people in these attacks and injured over 600 more. n Overwhelmingly, firearms and explosives were the most common weapons chosen: 55 of the incidents involved use or planned use of firearms; 55 involved use of explosives. Overall, incidents involving firearms were more likely to be deadly. n Right-wing terror incidents have involved a wide array of targets, with government, law enforcement, racial and religious targets the most common. n Right-wing terror incidents occur consistently because the movements from which they emanate are mature extremist movements with deep-seated roots. The Internet has made it easier for extremists to meet each other (and thus engage in plots), as well as to self-radicalize and become lone wolf offenders. n Right-wing terrorism is a subject under-covered by the media, in part perhaps because so many right-wing terror incidents take place far from major media centers and urban areas. One consequence of this relative lack of coverage has been an inadequate awareness among policy-makers and the public alike of the threat that violent right-wing extremists pose. n If the United States does not treat right-wing extremism as a real threat, the list of right-wing terror incidents can only grow.

New York: ADL, 2022. 28p.

By ADL Center on Extremism

Every year people with ties to a variety of extreme movements and causes kill people in the United States; the ADL Center on Extremism tracks these murders. Extremists regularly commit murders in the service of their ideology, in the service of a group or gang they may belong to, or while engaging in traditional, non-ideological criminal activities. In 2021, domestic extremists killed at least 29 people in the United States, in 19 separate incidents. This represents a modest increase from the 23 extremist-related murders documented in 2020 but is far lower than the number of murders committed in any of the five years prior (which ranged from 45 to 78). The 2021 murder totals were low primarily because no high-casualty extremist-related shooting spree occurred this past year. Such sprees are the main contributor to high murder totals. Most of the murders (26 of 29) were committed by right-wing extremists, which is usually the case. However, two killings were committed by Black nationalists and one by an Islamist extremist—the latter being the first such killing since 2018. Most of the 2021 murders were committed by people associated with longstanding extremist movements, such as white supremacy and the sovereign citizen movement. However, 2021 continued the trend of recent years of seeing some murders from newer types of extremism, including QAnon adherents, people associated with the toxic masculinity subculture of the “manosphere” and anti-vaccination extremists. White supremacists killed more people in 2021 than any other type of extremist, though not an outright majority, as is often the case. An in-depth look at white supremacist killings over the past 10 years demonstrates the dangers posed by alt right white supremacists and white supremacist prison gangs.

New York: Anti-Defamation League. 2022. 38p.

By Christina Schori Liang

Keypoints • There are growing links between terrorist and organised crime groups who are sharing expertise and are cooperating in kidnapping, arms, drugs and human trafficking, as well as drug production, cigarette smuggling, extortion and fraud. • The growing nexus of shared tactics and methods of terror and crime groups is due to four major developments: globalization, the communication revolution through the Internet, the end of the Cold War, and the global “war on terror”. • Both terrorist and organised crime groups are leveraging the Internet for recruitment, planning, psychological operations, logistics, and fundraising. The Internet has become the platform for both organised crime and terrorists to conduct cybercrimes ranging from video piracy, credit card fraud, selling drugs, extortion, money laundering and pornography. • The growing nexus has facilitated terrorists to access automatic weapons, including stand-off weapons and explosive devices, empowering them to challenge police, land and naval forces with the latest sophisticated weaponry and intelligence. • The growing nexus of terrorism and organised crime is exacerbating efforts in war-fighting and peacemaking in Iraq and Afghanistan. Also, West Africa in general and the Sahel in particular have become a dangerous new trafficking hub uniting both terrorists and organised crime cartels across a wide and mostly ungoverned land mass. • The growing nexus of terrorism and organised crime groups is challenging international and national security by weakening democratic institutions, compromising government institutions, damaging the credibility of financial institutions and by infiltrating the formal economy, leading to increased crime and human security challenges.

Geneva: Geneva Centre for Security Policy, 2011. 6p.