This month, the EU commemorated the 20th anniversary of terrorist attacks on commuter trains in Madrid, Spain. More than 190 people were killed and around 2,000 injured in the bombings, making it the second most deadly act of terrorism in Europe after the explosion of a Boeing 747 over Lockerbie in 1988.
As a show of unity and resilience against violent extremism, the EU established March 11 as the European Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Terrorism.
The 2004 Madrid train bombings revealed that Europe was not immune to jihadist terrorism. According to the investigation, the assault was orchestrated by a group of homegrown Muslim extremists enraged by the Spanish government’s endorsement of the Iraq war.
The perpetrators placed bags with explosives into four commuter trains and detonated them during the peak of rush hour on the morning of March 11.
Following the collapse of the ISIS caliphate in 2019 and a significant decrease in attacks, public concerns shifted to other pressing issues like Covid-19. As such, some analysts started speaking about so-called “terrorism fatigue” but time has shown that those sentiments were misleading.
Another war, another spike in terrorist activities. Earlier in March, Italian police arrested three people who were planning terror attacks. The suspects established a cell linked to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a network of military groups associated with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah movement.
In December, Hamas members were apprehended in Denmark, Germany and Holland amid suspicions of a planned attack on Jewish targets in Europe.
Meanwhile, the Ambassador of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) to the UN, Bojan Vujic, has admitted recently that the influx of foreign jihadists is a “serious terrorist threat from BiH.” He has cited Italian intelligence reports suggesting that around two dozen jihadist groups are currently active in his country.
Before the watershed 9/11 attacks in the US, there were significant variations in counterterrorism strategies among Western European nations.
Some countries, primarily France, Germany, and the UK, had previously faced terrorist violence, though generally not perpetrated by jihadists. Their governments had implemented well-developed counterterrorism policies long before the Global War on Terrorism started.
Among them, France was the most focused on the kind of jihadist threat posed by Al-Qaeda. By that time, the nation had already dealt with a number of assaults by Islamist extremists in the 1990s. This primarily concerns the Armed Islamic Group (GIA), an insurgent group that fought the Algerian governments and carried out several terror attacks in France.
As of today, Germany, France and the UK are still the most terrorism-impacted countries in Europe, according to the Global Terrorism Index. Hungary, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic are among the least affected in the region. In general, Eastern and Central European countries are almost unfamiliar with terrorism because of the lack of internal sources for its development.
“Radical Islam has never had a comfortable or suitable operational base here. Only a small Muslim minority lives in the region, and the V4 countries [the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia] have long refused to accept migrants from the Middle East,” said Jaroslav Kuchyna, a senior fellow at Prague Center For Transatlantic Relations.
“The consensus of Central European politicians across the ideological spectrum against illegal migration from Muslim countries persists here. The only country with a larger Muslim community is Austria, where the security risk associated with this community is much more pronounced than elsewhere in the region,” he told this author.
The Czech Republic has very little direct experience with terrorism, said Oldrich Bures, head of the Center for Security Studies at Metropolitan University Prague. He has also pointed out a limited number of Czech foreign fighters in Islamist groups in Syria and Iraq.
“This, however, also means counterterrorism was never really a top priority, and much of the existing legal and institutional framework is a consequence of the membership in the European Union – and the need to implement EU-level measures and cooperate with EU-level agencies. Even the legal code definition of terrorism is almost a verbatim copy/translation from the 2002 EU legislation,” the expert told this author.
In the aftermath of 9/11, many European nations enhanced the capacities of their intelligence agencies and partnered with the US in counterterrorism missions abroad. However, insufficient coordination and cooperation between European countries were still an issue.
As a new phenomenon, the Al Qaeda-style threat required governments to work more closely, both bilaterally and within the EU. A major step forward, therefore, was the adoption of the Council Framework Decision of June 13, 2002, on combating terrorism. The document was designed to help member states increase their cooperation in the field of counterterrorism, including combating terrorism financing.
In 2019, the European Judicial Counter-Terrorism Register was launched. This helpful operational tool allows European law enforcement to identify liaisons between individuals, terrorist networks, and investigations, both ongoing and past.
Another notable improvement was made in the domain of early detection and prevention of extremist offenses. So far, this approach has been playing an essential role in the fight against homegrown terrorism.
Among other measures, the EU Steering Board on Radicalization was established to prevent the spread of online extremist propaganda and develop counter-narratives. On national levels, lawmakers across Europe made prevention-focused changes to their counterterrorism policies.
While strengthening its counterterrorism capabilities, the European Union is keeping an eye on compliance with human rights and democratic values. The matter concerns not only the rights of suspected terrorists but also the freedoms of innocent people.
In 2018, the EU ratified the Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism, aimed at supporting the fight against terrorism. Apart from improving counterterrorism policies in the region, the document ensures that all the corresponding practices and laws respect human rights and freedoms.