International Terrorism

(September 29-October 10, 2005)
By Atty. Antonio A. Gallardo

Atty. Antonio A. Gallardo

The seminar covered several areas on terrorism such as the causes and its consequence on society, the institutions involved in counter terrorism strategies, the procedures in defining terrorism and the counter measures on terrorism.

On the first day, August 28, we got to know the Friedrich Naumann Stiftung. We were briefed on the rules of the workshop, and the participants were introduced to each other.

On August 29 and 30, we were given lectures on the meaning of terrorism, and what institutions exist in fighting it. After these lectures we broke up into working groups to evaluate the institutions fighting terrorism.

On August 31, we went into some role playing approximating the UN Conference on terrorism. In fact my assigned role was as the UN delegate of China which at first I found uncomfortable because one of my closest friends during the seminar was somebody from Tibet.

On September 1 our role playing continued and later in the afternoon we were given a lecture on Trans-National Counter Response on Terrorism.

On September 2, we visited the museum in Cologne, where the horrors of World War II were shown to us. I could sense during the museum tour the collective guilt feelings of the German people on the effects of the war especially in the persecution of the Jews.

September 3 was our final seminar day. Agreements were made on how to individually contribute to the fight against terrorism.

The seminar was quite enlightening because the experiences of the many countries that participated showed us the different faces of terrorism.

One real problem is how to come up with a universally acceptable definition of terrorism especially since today a freedom fighter may be a hero of a resistance movement, but he could also be somebody else’s terrorist or condemned by a government as terrorist.