written by Bahar Baser printable version send your friend

Wednesday, 11 November 2009

IV. A FOCUS ON THE HOSTLAND AND THE CURRENT CHALLENGES

In order to understand diaspora links to armed struggles one should pay attention to the opportunity structures that are created by the hostlands.  Before the 9/11, in most of the European states, the western governments often tolerated this support for violence because it was not considered an internal threat, but a foreign problem. However since 9/11, this attitude has drastically changed[i][i]. Nowadays, the perception is even changed to seeing diaspora groups as a threat to national security since they also get involved in terrorist activities targeting western countries. Before, some terrorist organizations even had offices in various European countries that were collecting political and financial support for terrorist activities or armed struggles in their homelands and abroad, explicitly or implicitly. As Gunaratna underlines:

“Terrorist groups have established transnational secret cells and semi-clandestine and open offices in most of the Western world’s larger cosmopolitan cities, including London, New York, Paris, Rome, and Madrid. Secret cells, as one would expect, engage in such clandestine functions as reconnaissance and surveillance. Semi-clandestine and open offices allow terrorist groups to accumulate political influence; they generate support rather than carry out attacks. In order to exploit state (politicians, political parties, host governments) and non-state sources (the diaspora, migrants, the host-society, and NGOs), terrorists increasingly choose to operate under the guise of social, cultural, economic, political, and religious front groups.[ii][ii]”

Some European states had began considering diaspora activism as a challenge long time before the “war on terror”, such as Germany banning PKK in 90’s,  they started taking serious measures recently. According to Zimmermann, many of the counter terrorism measures in place today, for instance, were developed even before 9/11 however they were only to be left on the back burner[iii][iii]. For instance Sri Lankan Tamils (SLT) in France were quite free to express their affiliations to the LTTE and there was no involvement from the French state. After the “war on terror” up until today, many SLT diaspora members have been arrested by the French state due to their affiliations for terrorism. So what we see today is: “Since 9/11, the international community has been trying to control the movement of terrorists, weapons, and dual technologies by tightening border controls regulating financial flows and transactions by monitoring financial institutions, and disrupting terrorist recruitment, procurement and training. Collectively, these actions seek to address the supply side of terrorism.[iv][iv]” However, there is also a demand side of the story. One should put extra effort to understand why the diaspora members choose to get involved in political violence when they are far from their homeland and all its troubles. Why is there such a demand for the creation of those kinds of networks?

At this juncture, it is important to have a deeper look on the foreign and domestic policy of the host country by the help of the questions given below.

*What conditions and factors make a member of a diaspora or migrant community want to join a terrorist network or support armed struggles back in the homeland?

*How could hostland target extremism? What should be the host land’s response to extremist diaspora members? 

*Shall the hostland’s tolerance towards the rights of diaspora groups end when and where acts of violence are involved??

*What are the challenges it poses to the security of the hostland’s own citizens?

*What could be the future implications for hostlands? How could hostlands shape their policies to move marginalized diasporas towards peaceful ways of resolving the conflicts in the homeland?

First of all, it is very important to find the reasons behind diaspora extremism. In order to do that, one should take into account numerous dynamics for instance, from “level of integration” to the “abuse of diasporas by the homeland insurgent groups.” Is it the level of trans-state loyalties or is it the fact that diaspora members feel themselves as an outsider in the hostlands and find solidarity by extreme means? Or is it the fact that they do not feel secure for their future in the hostland and they always keep in mind the possibility to go back home?  Policy implications to the hostlands should be made keeping in mind the complex relationship between the homeland, hostland and the diaspora. For instance, Sullivan addresses the potential safety measures as the following when he talks about countering the reach of the global jihad within networked diasporas as a global security priority. [v][v]

• Police and intelligence services worldwide must develop relationships with diaspora communities. These efforts must build upon community policing and develop the cultural understanding and community trust required to recognize the emergence of extremist cells, radicalization, efforts to recruit terrorists, and efforts to exploit criminal enterprises or gangs to further terrorist activities.


•  These efforts need to be linked to develop the intelligence needed to combat a global networked threat. This requires more than “information-sharing” and co-operation, it requires a multi-lateral framework for the “co-production” of intelligence so police and intelligence services can recognize global interactions with local impact and local activity with global reach.