UN committee recommends working group for anti-terrorism treaties

A United Nations General Assembly committee has recommended the establishment of a working group to settle outstanding issues in two draft conventions on terrorism, including the definition of terrorism itself, and the possible holding of a high-level UN conference on an international organized response to all forms of the scourge.

The Ad Hoc Committee on Measures to Eliminate Terrorism wrapped up its seventh session yesterday with a recommendation that the Assembly’s Legal Committee consider setting up the group to continue the elaboration of the treaties, a comprehensive convention on international terrorism and an international convention for the suppression of acts of nuclear terrorism.

Adopting the draft report of its three-day session, the Committee also recommended keeping on its agenda the question of convening a high-level conference, under UN auspices, to formulate a joint organized response of the international community to terrorism in all its forms and manifestations.

The comprehensive convention on international terrorism would aim to fill in gaps left by sectoral treaties, which deal exclusively with particular manifestations of terrorist activity. While preliminary agreement has been reached on the majority of the draft treaty’s 27 articles, the issues of the convention’s scope, the preamble, a definition of phrases and a definition of terrorism are still outstanding.

Established by the General Assembly in 1996, the Ad Hoc Committee has the task of harmonizing international legal structures against terrorism. So far, it has successfully negotiated two treaties: the 1997 International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombing, and the 1999 International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism.