Countering Financing Terrorism, Panacea for Weakening Terrorists Operational Capabilities
Countering financing of terrorist organisations has been identified as the best strategy for weakening and curtailing operational capabilities of terrorism and terrorist organisations across the globe. The Commandant, National Defence College, Rear Admiral Olumuyiwa Olotu revealed this in his remarks to participants of Defence and Security Management Course 8 Seminar of the National Defence College Nigeria in Abuja. He said the Seminar which has a theme ‘Countering the Financing of Terrorists: Leveraging Global and Regional Institutional Mechanisms for National Action’ speaks volume to a complex array of security issues facing the world, especially terrorism financing and also interrogates both regional as well as global instruments available to understand and address the threat.
Admiral Olotu further stated that financial capabilities of terrorist organisations have gone down over the years as a result of concerted efforts at the international, regional and national levels to counter terrorism financing through coordinated institutional frameworks and initiatives. “Global initiatives like Financial Action Task Force, Inter-Governmental Action Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa, Nigeria Financial Intelligent Unit (NFIU) and Economic and Financial Crimes Commission have all played critical roles which resulted in the decline of the financial strength of terrorist organisations” the Commandant said. Admiral Olotu then called on all concerned to reinforce and sustain these efforts by ensuring further diminishing of financial capabilities of terrorist organisations to safeguard national, regional and global security interests. He charged participants in the Seminar to make good use of the opportunity provided to harness information and knowledge from resource persons in the field of financial security.
Speaking further, the Commandant assured of the College readiness to continue to provide valuable training programmes to enhance capacities adding that the Centre for Strategic Research and Studies (CSRS) has developed a new course on Countering the Financing of Terrorists and Regional Security. The Seminar witnessed paper presentations by Prof Ivica Simonovski and Amb Prof Abdullahi Shehu on global and regional perspectives of the theme, respectively. The seminar attracted participants from the armed forces, security and para military institutions, as well as relevant financial units. Highpoints of the seminar were presentations and robust discussion of the theme by experts from the NPF, DSS, DIA, EFCC, ICPC, NFIU, GIABA, NCTC, CCB, NFIU, CBN and FMoJ.
