EU targets IS 'foreign terrorist fighters' in protocol

Seventeen EU members including France, Germany, Britain and Belgium have signed an international agreement to thwart the recruitment of "foreign terrorist fighters" who travel from Europe to conflict zones abroad, notably in Syria.

 

The Council of Europe protocol, agreed on Thursday, amends existing provisions to outlaw a number of terrorism-related acts.

 

These include "travelling abroad for the purpose of terrorism", "receiving training for terrorism" and "organising or otherwise facilitating travelling abroad for the purpose of terrorism" - which explicitly includes providing funding to armed groups.

 

"Rarely has such a treaty received such unanimous support from the beginning," Council of Europe chief Thorbjorn Jagland at its signing in the Latvian capital, Riga.

 

"All of this shows our commitment to send a positive signal to all would-be terrorists: Europe is closing in, we are not waiting for you, we are coming for you," he said.

 

The protocol had been put together in a record seven weeks because of the serious threat posed by foreign fighters joining groups in Syria and Iraq, Jagland added.

 

The agreement must now be ratified by individual national parliaments.

 

The move comes as a UN panel studying foreign recruitment said this week that the Islamic State group (IS) is paying recruiters up to $10,000 for each person they sign up. 

 

It also comes as analysis firm IHS Jane is warning of a huge spike in IS-related deaths and attacks.

 

A major increase in violence saw over 1,000 attacks and nearly 3,000 deaths worldwide in the past three months, said IHS Jane.

 

There was a a 42-percent jump in daily attacks by the group, averaging 11.8 per day from July to September, up from 8.3 per day between April and June.