Bangladesh offers to share counter-terrorism experience with global community

Bangladesh has offered to share its own experiences of addressing “terrorism and violent extremism” with the international community.

Foreign Secretary Md Shahidul Haque made the offer on Tuesday in Geneva while addressing the Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund’s (GCERF) first board meeting.

He has been selected as a member of the 15-member GCERF governing board, the foreign ministry said in a media release.

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The idea of this platform was mooted at the Global Counter Terrorism Forum (GCTF) meeting on the sidelines of the 68th UNGA in New York in September last year.

It is aimed at supporting the local community-level initiatives in the areas of education, youth, women’s advocacy, public awareness, social entrepreneurship and vocational training for “strengthening resilience against violent extremist agenda”.

The secretary said violent extremism was one of the two major challenges to development in Bangladesh. The other was climate change.

But he said that the government was combating the violent extremism with different national initiatives, experiences of which he offered to share with others.

He also reiterated Bangladesh’s ‘zero tolerance’ policy towards terrorism and extremism.

The Board has adopted a multi-stakeholder constituency model having representatives from donors, recipient countries, private sector, CSOs, and research organizations to operate the GCERF.

Representatives of the Switzerland, US, Canada (UK-alternate), Australia (New Zealand-alternate), Qatar, Mali, Nigeria, Morocco, European Commission, Women without Borders, International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT)-The Hague, the Soufan Group, Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP), and Tony Blair Faith Foundation are the other members of the board.

The Board has made Khalid Koser as the Executive Director of the GCERF Secretariat located in Geneva, and former Executive Director of UNICEF Carol Bellamy as its Chair.

The Secretariat has targeted to raise a total of $200 million over the next 10 years to fund projects in various countries across the world to combat violent extremism.

The foreign ministry is expecting that the core funding will be made available for projects in Bangladesh along with Mali, Morocco and Nigeria at the initial phase.

The secretary appreciated GCERF Secretariat for being transparent in the Fund’s formation process.