Abstract
Nowadays threats are diffuse and hybrid with a pertinent “role” of non-state actors. Criminal networks are capable of quickly exploiting vulnerabilities in the security environment.
The global security environment remains extremely dynamic. New security challenges and threats are increasingly blended and integrated. Many of the governmental structures in the countries with whom the EU is working in the field of external relations will struggle to cope with these challenges.
All these developments require the EU to revisit its response options. This paper proposes a number of steps to simplify the overall architecture of the EU’s external financing assistance. It makes a number of recommendations on the focus of cooperation. Based on the experience under the EU CBRN risk mitigation Centres of Excellence initiative and EU policy to promote cybersecurity, it recommends that greater emphasis be placed on addressing governance issues in order to deal more effectively with the new security challenges.
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Notes
- 1.
The NTI Nuclear Security Index is a first-of-its-kind public benchmarking project of nuclear materials security conditions on a country-by-country basis. The 2016 NTI index shows that progress to secure weapons-usable nuclear materials has slowed down in comparison to previous years.
- 2.
The number of cases is in reality probably higher because of the number of unreported cases.
- 3.
A dirty bomb or radiological dispersal device is a radiological weapon that combines radioactive material with conventional explosives.
- 4.
See Decision of OPCW Executive Council of 10 March 2017, https://www.opcw.org/news/article/opcw-executive-council-condemns-chemical-weapons-use-in-fatal-incident-in-malaysia/
- 5.
IHS Conflict Monitor, London 2017.
- 6.
Speech held at the 53rd Munich Security Conference, 18 February 2017.
- 7.
The Global Terrorism Index, Institute for Economics and Peace, 2015. Terrorism in the year of reporting remains highly concentrated in Iraq, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Syria. Unofficial information indicates that in 2015 on the African continent 4000 attacks took place killing over 30,000 persons. See also the Global Peace Index 2016 of the same institute. Figures on the economic impact of various terrorist attacks vary considerably depending on the methodology used and time period covered. The OECD calculated that the direct costs related to the 9/11 attacks are above $27 billion. Other sources put the total cost much higher than the OECD estimate.
- 8.
The total value of the illicit trade in wildlife is estimated to be around 20 billion euro per year.
- 9.
According to some sources, in some West African countries 60% of anti-malarial medicines available on the market are ineffective fakes. According to Al Jazeera (19 March 2017) is nearly 1 out of every 3 drugs in Africa illicit or counterfeited. Ivory Coast destroyed 50 tonnes of fake medicine worth more than one million USD.
- 10.
EUROPOL Report, European Union Serious and Organised Crime Threat Assessment Crime in the age of technology, March 2017.
- 11.
A Global strategy for the EU’s Foreign and Security Policy, p. 53, June 2016.
- 12.
Council of the European Union, Council Conclusions on strengthening the EU internal security’s external dimension in the Western Balkans including via the Integrative Internal Security Governance (IISG), 9 December 2016.
- 13.
The retail value of the European drugs market is estimated to be at least two billion euro per month. A recent report (Rand Corporation, Brussels, July 2016) on internet-facilitated drugs trade (crypto-markets) estimates this market to have a monthly revenue of 12–22 million euro. See also The Globalization of Crime, A Transnational Organised Crime Threat Assessment, UNODC, 2010.
- 14.
Opening Statement, NATO Deputy General Ambassador Alexander Vershow at the Annual NATO Conference on WMD Arms Control, Disarmament and Non-proliferation, Ljubljana, Slovenia, 9 May 2016.
- 15.
G8-Global Partnership Working Group (GPWG), recommendations for a coordinated approach in the field of global weapons of mass destruction, knowledge proliferation, and scientists’ engagement, 2009.
- 16.
The Global Risks Report, 2017, 12th Edition, pp. 42–47, World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland.
- 17.
Intangible transfers refer, inter alia, to the transmission of software, DNA sequences and technology by electronic media, new cyber-tools (cyber-surveillance technologies), and new forms of financial transactions such as Bitcoin.
- 18.
Commission Staff Working Document of 28 September 2016, Impact Assessment, Report on the EU Export Control Policy Review, SWD (2016), page 3.
- 19.
In order to provide a concrete framework for collective EU commitment to the fight against proliferation, the European Union adopted the so-called EU New Lines for Action. The document, as endorsed by EU Council Conclusions in 2008 as well as in 2010 and 2013, includes actions such as the review and strengthening of export controls on dual-use items. Concerns are expressed and an increase of vigilance is recommended with respect to “…protecting the access to proliferation-sensitive knowledge” and “…further strengthening protection of our scientific and technical assets against unintended transfers of sensitive technology and know-how, including dual-use items”; http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/EN/foraff/139067.pdf
- 20.
Interfax, May 2015.
- 21.
The joint Framework on Countering Hybrid Threats, 6 April 2016, JOIN (2016)18 final defines hybrid threats as a mixture of coercive and subversive activity, conventional and unconventional methods (i.e., diplomatic, military, economic, technological) which can be used in a coordinated manner by state and non-state actors to achieve specific objectives while remaining below the threshold of formally declared warfare.
- 22.
West, Jessica, The Political Economy of Organised Crime and State Failure: The Nexus of Greed, Need and Grievance, Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, Carleton University, Ottawa 2006, page 11.
- 23.
Attacks on 18 March 2017 and on 22 March 2017, See: Criminal Pasts, Terrorist Futures: European Jihadists and the New Crime - Terror Nexus, The International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Practical Violence (ICSR) Authors: Raman Basra, Peter Neumann, Claudia Brunner, London, UK, 2016.
- 24.
Joint communication from the European Commission and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, JOIN (2013) 30 final, Brussels 11 December 2013.
- 25.
For a comprehensive overview of EU policies and initiatives in the world, see: The EU and the World: Player and Policies, post-Lisbon, A Handbook, Edited by Antonio Missiroli, EU Institute for Security Studies, 2016, Paris, France.
- 26.
Speech Commissioner Mimica at the event of the Overseas Development Institute, London, Europe in the World: Promoting Peace and Security, 26 January 2016.
- 27.
Joint Communication by the European Commission and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Brussels, 18 November 2015, JOIN (2015) 50 final, page 12–15.
- 28.
A European agenda on migration, 2015, Valletta summit on migration.
- 29.
Joint Communication by the European Commission and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Strasbourg, 22 November 2016, JOIN (2016) 52 final, page 15.
- 30.
A Global Strategy for the EU’s Foreign and Security Policy, June 2016, page 42.
- 31.
Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council setting up a Union regime for the control of exports, transfer, brokering, technical assistance, and transit of dual-use items (recast) of 28.09.2016, COM (2016) 616 (final).
- 32.
Article 21(2) TEU.
- 33.
Final document on the 2016 comprehensive review, S/2016/1038 of the status of implementation of resolution 1540 (2004), New York, 9 December 2016.
- 34.
UNSCR 2325 (2016) of 15 December 2016.
- 35.
For a more personal account of the review, see message of the Chair: Two Years before the Mast, by H.E. Mr. Roman Marchesi, 1540 Compass, Winter 2015, issue 11, pages 3–10.
- 36.
European Court of Auditors, Special Report 2014/17, Can the EU’s Centres of Excellence initiative contribute effectively to mitigating chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear risks from outside the EU?, page 14.
- 37.
A comparison shows that Senegal is the only African country that fully participates in both the EU’s CBRN imitative and in executing UNSCR 1540.
- 38.
For an overview of CBRN assistance and capacity-building programmes for African states, see report of the Institute for Security Studies, Pretoria, South Africa, 2016.
- 39.
- 40.
Budapest Convention on Cybercrime, signed in Budapest on 23/11/2001, Council of Europe.
- 41.
Officially announced on 23 January 2017.
- 42.
Commission Implementing Decision of 27 July 2016 on the Annual Action Programme 2016 for Article 5 of the Instrument contributing to Stability and Peace.
- 43.
Joint Communication from the European Commission and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy on Cybersecurity of the European Union, JOIN (2013) 1 final, 07.02.2013.
- 44.
See Council Conclusions on Cyber Diplomacy adopted on 11 February 2015.
- 45.
Joint Communication from the European Commission and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy on a Joint Framework on Countering Hybrid Threats, JOIN (2016) 18, 06.04.2016.
- 46.
OJ L 77,15.03.2014, p. 95.
- 47.
- 48.
The African Peace Facility is funded by the European Development Fund and EU military operations under the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) through the so-called external Athena Mechanism by 27 Member-States with an opt-out for Denmark. Missions are taking place for example in the Horn of Africa, Mali, and Somalia.
- 49.
COM (2015) 185 final, Strasbourg, 28.04.2015. It identifies, inter alia, three priorities, namely the fight against terrorism, the fight against organised crime and the fight against cybercrime.
- 50.
Revised Reporting directives on ODA in the field of Peace and Security as agreed on 18–19 February 2016 by the OECD Development Assistance Committee. A casebook on peace and security related activities in accordance with the updated ODA reporting directives, is currently being prepared.
- 51.
Joint Communication by the European Commission and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Strasbourg, 5 July 2016, JOIN (2016) 31 final. It defines, inter alia, possible EU support for the security sector in partner countries.
- 52.
Proposal of the European Commission amending Regulation (EU) No. 230/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2014 establishing an instrument contributing to stability and peace, Strasbourg, 5 July 2016, CON(2016) 447 final.
- 53.
See also Professor Beatrice de Graaf, Terrorism as a Historical Phenomenon, NPO 1 broadcast), 12 March 2016.
- 54.
The Juncker priority 9, Europe as a Stronger Global Actor, A new start for Europe, Jean-Claude Juncker, Strasbourg, 15 July 2014.
- 55.
See for example state building contracts with Mali and South Sudan.
- 56.
This facility is the overall political and institutional framework for the promotion of democracy, governance, and human rights in Africa. It was established in 2011 in the Headquarters of the African Union in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
- 57.
Johan Engvall, the State as an investment Market: Kyrgyzstan in Comparative Perspective, Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016.
- 58.
The aim of this initiative is to improve fiscal outcomes and address related implementation challenges in order to implement the post 2015 development agenda, European Commission (2014), Commission Implementation Decision of 23.07.2014 adopting a Multiannual Indicative Programme for the Thematic Programme “Global Public Goods and Challenges” for the period 2014–2020, C (2014) 5072 final.
- 59.
See for example the IAEA Implementing guide on Nuclear Security, IAEA Nuclear Security Studies, IAEA, 2008.
- 60.
Council of the European Union, Council Conclusions on strengthening the EU internal security’s external dimension in the Western Balkans including via the Integrative Internal Security Governance (IISG), 9 December 2016, p. 6
- 61.
See for example the Governance Facility for Uganda, created by eight of Uganda’s International Development Partners among others the EU.
- 62.
Addis Ababa Action Agenda of the Third International Conference on Financing for Development, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 13.07.2015.
- 63.
On 30 May 2016, President Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan instructed the Government to introduce innovations and best international practices into the national civil service of Kazakhstan.
- 64.
Transforming our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, Resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 25 September, A/RES/70/1.
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The authors write in their personal capacity. The views set out in this article are those of the authors and they do not represent in any way the official point of view of the European Commission or any other EU institution. Neither the European Union institutions and bodies nor any person acting on their behalf may be held responsible for the use which may be made of the information contained therein. Any mistakes or omissions are solely those of the authors.
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van der Meer, A., Aspidi, A. (2017). Security, Development, and Governance CBRN and Cyber in Africa. In: Martellini, M., Malizia, A. (eds) Cyber and Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear, Explosives Challenges. Terrorism, Security, and Computation. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-62108-1_19
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