Countering terrorist, extremist narratives using cyberspace to be PM Modi's focus at UN meet

Countering terrorist and extremist narratives using internet and cyberspace will be Prime Minister Narendra Modi's key area of focus at a counter-terrorism meeting convened by the United Nations, India's Permanent Representative to the UN, Syed Akbaruddin said on Friday.

"Today, terrorists operate well beyond boundaries. They are using social media platforms, and the internet in general, in inimical ways. So the focus of the event the Prime Minister will participate in at the UN is on countering terrorist narratives and violent extremists through internet and cyberspace," Akbaruddin told ANI.

The envoy said that addressing the challenges of terrorism will always be a theme in India's foreign policy orientation, because "it affects our people in ways which very few external influences do".

In view of the same, the Prime Minister has made a call for an international conference to counter terrorism.

The envoy noted the two main developments pertaining to UN's actions with respect to counter-terrorism this year, namely, the listing of Masood Azhar as a global terrorist, and UNSC's condemnation of the terrorist attack against Indian soldiers in Pulwama.

The UN meeting on countering terrorism has come ahead of the Financial Action Task Force's (FATF) final decision next month on whether to blacklist Pakistan or to keep it in its grey list or not. The inter-governmental organisation had given the country four months to improve its counter-terror financing operations.

Speaking on the same, Akbaruddin said, "The FATF operates on evidence which is factual in nature, which is substantive and is based on empirical data that is a separate process.."

On being asked whether India would highlight cross-border terrorism by Pakistan during PM Modi's visit, Akbaruddin said, "Anybody who threatens peace and security of our country deserves to be addressed forcefully. These are all tactical decisions, how we do it when we do it, we just have to wait and see how this evolves," he said.

The Prime Minister departed for a six-day visit to the United States on Friday.