Organized Crime And Terrorist Networks

This collection explores organized crime and terror networks and the points at which they intersect. It analyses the close relationships between these criminalities, the prevalence and ambiguity of this nexus, the technological elements facilitating it, and the financial aspects embedded in this criminal partnership. Organized Crime and Terrorist Networks is the outcome of empirical research, seminars, workshops and interviews carried out by a multinational consortium of researchers within ‘TAKEDOWN’, a Horizon 2020 project funded by the European Commission. The consortium’s objective was to examine the perspectives, requirements and misgivings of front-line practitioners operating in the areas of organized crime and terrorism. The chapters collected in this volume are the outcome of such analytical efforts. The topics addressed include the role of Information and Communication Technology in contemporary criminal organizations, terrorism financing, online transnational criminality, identity crime, the crime-terror nexus and tackling the nexus at supranational level. This book offers a compelling contribution to scholarship on organized crime and terrorism, and considers possible directions for future research. It will be of much interest to students and researchers engaged in studies of criminology, criminal justice, crime control and prevention, organized crime, terrorism, political violence, and cybercrime.

Postmodern global terrorist groups engage sovereign nations asymmetrically with prolonged, sustained campaigns driven by ideology. Increasingly, transnational criminal organizations operate with sophistication previously only found in multinational corporations. Unfortunately, both of these entities can now effectively hide and morph, keeping law e

The nexus between terrorism and organised crime consists of a strategic alliance between two non-state actors who are able to exploit illegal markets, threaten the security of individuals, and influence policy-making on a global level. Recent Europol reports have pointed towards the importance of studying the links between organised crime and terrorist groups, and have underlined that the nature and extent of these connections have seldom been addressed from an academic perspective. Considering the danger that both organised crime and terrorism currently pose to the world, the collusion between these two phenomena is of urgent contemporary interest. Basing itself on geographical case-studies, this book contributes to the existing literature in three ways: by enriching the empirical knowledge on the nature of the crime-terror nexus and its evolution; by exploring the impact of the nexus within different economic, political and societal contexts; and by expanding on its theoretical conceptualization. This book was originally published as a special issue of Global Crime.

The emergence of new hybrid (state and nonstate) transnational criminal/terrorist franchises in Latin America operating under broad state protection now pose a tier-one security threat for the United States. Similar hybrid franchise models are developing in other parts of the world, making understanding the new dynamics an important factor in a broader national security context. This threat goes well beyond the traditional nonstate theory of constraints activity such as drug trafficking, money laundering, and human trafficking into the potential for trafficking related to weapons of mass destruction by designated terrorist organizations and their sponsors. These activities are carried out with the support of regional and extra regional states actors whose leadership is deeply enmeshed in criminal activity, which yields billions of dollars in illicit revenues every year. These same leaders have a publicly articulated, common doctrine of asymmetrical warfare against the United States and its allies that explicitly endorses as legitimate the use of weapons of mass destruction. The central binding element in this alliance is a hatred for the West, particularly the United States, and deep anti-Semitism, based on a shared view that the 1979 Iranian Revolution was a transformative historical event. For Islamists, it is evidence of divine favor; and for Bolivarians, a model of a successful asymmetrical strategy to defeat the "Empire." The primary architect of this theology/ideology that merges radical Islam and radical, anti-Western populism and revolutionary zeal is the convicted terrorist Ilich Sánchez Ramirez, better known as "Carlos the Jackal," whom Chávez has called a true visionary.

During the last ten years an increasing number of government and media reports, scholarly books and journal articles, and other publications have focused our attention on the expanded range of interactions between international organized crime and terrorist networks. A majority of these interactions have been in the form of temporary organizational alliances (or customer-supplier relationships) surrounding a specific type of transaction or resource exchange, like document fraud or smuggling humans, drugs or weapons across a particular border. The environment in which terrorists and criminals operate is also a central theme of this literature. These research trends suggest the salience of this book which addresses how organized criminal and terrorist networks collaborate, share knowledge and learn from each other in ways that expand their operational capabilities. The book contains broad conceptual pieces, historical analyses, and case studies that highlight different facets of the intersection between crime and terrorism. These chapters collectively help us to identify and appreciate a variety of dynamics at the individual, organizational, and contextual levels. These dynamics, in turn, inform a deeper understanding of the security threat posted by terrorists and criminal networks and how to respond more effectively. This book was published as a special issue of Terrorism and Political Violence.

In the post-9/11 era, the nexus between organized crime and terrorism has raised much concern and has been widely discussed in both academic and policy circles, but is still largely misunderstood. This critical book contributes innovatively to the debate by distinguishing three types of nexus—interaction, transformation/imitation and similarities—and identifying the promoting factors of each type.

Seminar paper from the year 2012 in the subject Politics - Topic: Peace and Conflict, Security, grade: 1,0, Humboldt-University of Berlin, language: English, abstract: “We will direct every resource at our command to win the war against terrorists, every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence. We will starve the terrorists of funding, turn them against each other, rout them out of their safe hiding places, and bring them to justice” (Cited in Biersteker and Eckert 2008: 1). President George W. Bush, September 24, 2001 In the immediate aftermath of the attacks in the United States on 11 September 2001 President W. Bush declared America’s “War on Terrorism” in which he assured to defeat terrorist movements and their methods of funding that could be used to support the acts of global terrorist (Biersteker and Eckert 2008; 1). The examination of broader terrorism studies literature shows “financial and material resources are correctly perceived as the lifeblood of terrorist operations, and governments have determined that fighting the financial infrastructure of terrorist organizations is the key to their defeat” (Grialdo and Trinkunas 2007; 1). Since the attacks of 9/11 the US has designed a strong strategy to fight terrorist groups and their financing. International and national measures have been carried out such as the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, the enforcement of international sanctions, and the expansion of law enforcement to target terrorism financing and disrupt terrorist operation (Sheppard 2002). However, the spectrum of terrorist funding is broad. In particular, the increasing reliance on criminal activities by terrorist since the end of the Cold War and the subsequent decline of state sponsorship, such as the rising pressure of law enforcement, network structures became an essential source to safeguard the existence of many terrorist and criminal groups. The development of the so- called “crime- terror” nexus, in which two traditionally autonomous groups started to expose various operational and structural parallels, implicated a key income source for terrorists and has brought sheer difficulty to develop successful strategies to freeze the terrorist monetary trail. In the following, this essay examines the involvement of terrorist groups in criminal activities as a source of funding and whether or not it is a sustainable and profitable source for terrorist funding. Moreover, we try to evaluate to what extent the so- called “terror-crime nexus” poses a threat to global security.

Contents: (1) Intro.; (2) Crime-Terrorism Partnerships and Transformations; (3) The Crime-Terrorism Toolbox; (4) Interaction of Terrorism and Crime: Dawood Ibrahim¿s D-Co.; Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia; 2004 Madrid Bombers; The Taliban; Abu Ghadiyah, Monzer Al Kassar and Viktor Bout; Hezbollah; Al Qaeda; 2005 London Bombings; Al-Shabaab; Mexico¿s La Familia, Colombia¿s Medellin, Italy¿s Mafia, and Brazil¿s Prison Gangs; (5) Selected U.S. Gov¿t. Actions Addressing the Confluence of International Terrorism and Transnat. Organized Crime; State Dept.; Treasury Dept.; Fin¿l. Crimes Enforce. Network; DoD; DoJ: IOC-2; DEA; FBI; DHS; Intell. Comm¿y.; (6) Counterterrorism: What Role for Anti-Crime?