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Following the decision from the EU Justice and Home Affairs Ministers in November 2015, the ECTC was set up as a unit within the framework of Europol in January 2016, designed to function as a central information hub specialised in the fight against terrorism.172 Although Europol had previously counted with
various Focal Points where counterterrorism experts of national units collaborated and relevant intelligence was shared, the establishment of the ECTC is proof that terrorism has become a top priority on the agenda of the organisation. Europol is currently undergoing a restructuring process that foresees the setting up of individual centres dedicated to particular fields of crime. Within this context, the European Cybercrime Centre was created in 2013 to reflect the ongoing shift of criminal activities to online environments, as well as the European Migrant Smuggling Centre in 2016 to address the facilitation of illegal migration across the Mediterranean and along the Balkan route.
The ECTC is a forum to exchange intelligence specifically related to the threat of Islamist terrorism, with the aim to raise trust and awareness among national counter-terrorism units. The EU Commissioner for Justice and Home Affairs commented the establishment of the ECTC as follows:
“This is an initiative which carries great promise. We want the Centre to pool, streamline and increase information sharing between Member States in their fight against terrorism. Because in challenging times like these, we must work together, and not in isolation. We want the Centre to reinforce Europol's counter-terrorism capabilities as a platform for Member States to increase information sharing and operational coordination. […] The goal of the European Counter Terrorism Centre is to assist and support Member States, not to duplicate or compete with their work.” 173
169 Interview with Jelle van Buuren, Annex II: 84. 170 Interview with ECTC official, Annex III: 89.
171Bigo, Brouwer, et. al., ‘The EU Counter-Terrorism Policy Responses to the Attacks in Paris’: 2.
172 European Police Office, ‘Europol’s European Counter Terrorism Centre strengthens the EU’s response to terror’, Europol Press Releases, 25 January 2015.
173 Dmitris Avramopoulos, ‘Remarks by Commissioner Avramopoulos at the launch of Europol's European Counter Terrorism Centre (ECTC)’, European Commission Press Release Database, Amsterdam, 25 January 2016.
The establishment of the ECTC had already been proposed by Europol to the COSI in March 2015, with the aim to provide operational added value to the activities of Member States’ competent authorities in strictly identified counterterrorism priority areas.174 However, initially the proposal was not supported by all
stakeholders involved. In June 2015, the German government responded to a parliamentary inquiry by the left-wing faction, declaring that the EU should have no further powers in relation to intelligence cooperation and Member States should only be making use of existing structures to share information. It further stated that Europol was not the relevant agency to support intelligence agencies and the federal government rejected such involvement.175 The government also positioned itself in the debate surrounding the creation
of the ECTC, rejecting its establishment and emphasizing that already existing tools should be used in the fight against terrorism.176 However, it reversed its stance in November 2015, stating that “the merging of
focal points previously located in separated units under a unified leadership would make the internal coordination and communication at Europol easier”177. This proves how Germany changed its position
towards the new centre in light of the incidents in Paris, and the formal establishment of the ECTC is largerly perceived as a result of the Paris attacks.178 The federal government now appears to be supportive
of information exchange through the ECTC. Moreover, German Interior Minister de Maizière has even lamented that 90% of information shared at the ECTC comes from only five member states.179
The interview with a senior analyst in counter-terrorism gave a valuable insight into the workings of the ECTC.180 Having worked at Europol for many years, the interviewee has been familiar with the
counter-terrorism operations of the agency before and after the launching of the ECTC. As the centre was established just a few months after the Paris November attacks, it was of particular relevance for this research to understand how counter-terrorism collaboration was conducted prior to the events in November 2015. The official confirms what has been written in academic literature about the field of counter-terrorism: Although it has always been high on policy agendas, there has not been much evidence of cooperation at Europol, as terrorism continues to be dealt with on a bilateral level and largely remains confined to security and intelligence services, who are not necessarily represented at the agency and prefer to cooperate through informal channels. Asked to what extent the launching of the ECTC had been advanced before the attacks, he declares, “the idea was there, but no one was doing anything”, asserting that there was no widespread support or urgency felt towards moving ahead in the planning of the centre.
174 Council of the European Union, ‘Draft report to the European Parliament and national Parliaments on the proceedings of the Standing Committee on operational cooperation on internal security for the period July 2014 - December 2015’, Brussels, 26 February 2016. 175 Deutscher Bundestag, Antwort der Bundesregierung auf die Kleine Anfrage der Abgeordneten Andrej Hunko, Wolfgang Gehrcke, Annette Groth, weiterer Abgeordneter und der Fraktion DIE LINKE, Doc. 18/5048 (3 June 2015): 2.
176 Ibid.
177 Deutscher Bundestag, Antwort der Bundesregierung auf die Kleine Anfrage der Abgeordneten Andrej Hunko, Wolfgang Gehrcke, Jan van Aken, weiterer Abgeordneter und der Fraktion DIE LINKE, Doc. 18/6534 (18 November 2015): 2.
178 Markus Becker and Claudia Nielsen, ‚Europas Anti-Terrorkampf: Was der eine weiß, erfährt der andere noch lange nicht‘, Spiegel, [online] 24 March 2016.
179 Ibid.
180 As the respondent wished to remain anonymous, no further details concerning his professional background can be given on this occasion. He asked for his responses not to be recorded, so notes taken by the researcher were compiled into answers after the interview. The interview script presented in Annex III thus constitutes a paraphrasing of his responses to the best abilities of the interviewer.
He cites the shooting outside the Jewish museum in Brussels in 2014 as the first incident of a foreign fighter returning to Europe to commit a terrorist attack. Political pressure to address the issue increased with the Charlie Hebdo shootings in January 2015, but the incident was considered a French case and did not lead to any significant changes in information sharing with other European agencies. According to the interviewee, this changed dramatically with the Paris attacks in November 2015. In the hours following the coordinated attacks, it became clear to authorities that the perpetrators originated from Belgium, and he recounts being in contact with a former colleague in Brussels, with whom he discussed the potential of Europol getting involved in the investigations. He emphasizes the role of personal ties, saying the Belgian police officer probably would not have requested assistance from Europol if he had not had a direct contact at the agency. However, due to the joint working history of the two colleagues, trust to share information was already present and led the Belgian official to convince senior staff within his department to cooperate with Europol. The interviewee sees this as one of the main weaknesses of top-down decisions like the creation of the ECTC: the final decision to collaborate is not made by policymakers, but by prosecutors at operational level, who may be rather reluctant to share information if they do not have a trusted partner at the European level.
While the focusing event has generated unprecedented attention for the organisation as well as a strong willingness at the policy level to enhance its role, the respondent believes other factors have played an important part in paving the way for the ECTC to be established. The timing of the attacks came at an opportune moment for Europol, as the agency had already been undergoing an organisational overhaul and has thus been able to test new concepts and platforms in real life conditions. The technical capabilities of the ECTC are increasingly used and appreciated by Member States directly involved in counter-terrorism operations and investigations. The Taskforce Fraternité, set up to assist French authorities after the Paris attacks, produces analysis in French and is thus specifically tailored towards readers working for French and Belgian agents. He believes that “we now have a brand that is known”, citing the example of a mobile officer from Europol who was deployed to Nice in the immediate aftermath of the attacks to assist evidence gathering in the field; a move he considers to have been unthinkable in previous attacks.
Other departments at Europol may also further prove a game changer in the perception of Europol as a useful tool in the fight against terrorism. The deployment of Europol guest officers to assist Italian and Greek border forces at hotspots for migrant smuggling in the Mediterranean could be a further step in winning the trust and appreciation of Member State authorities. The technological capabilities developed at the Cyber Crime Centre and through the Internal Referral Unit exceed the cyber expertise of most EU countries. While Europol was a simple broker of information before, it now counts with a range of products it can offer Member States. Nonetheless, the interviewee emphasizes that it is too early to evaluate the success of the ECTC, as its real added value remains to be seen.
Explaining what led to the changed attitude of Germany towards the establishment of the ECTC, the respondent states that the transnational nature of the recent attacks has sent a clear signal to bigger states that it is becoming increasingly difficult to deal with the terrorist threat unilaterally. On a policy level, all states are now aware that they cannot cope alone. Nonetheless, considering its demographics and high risk to be targeted by terrorists, Germany is not strongly represented at the ECTC. The interviewee confirms de Maizière allegations that only a small number of Member States is actively participating in the work of the ECTC, but he also underlines that not every MS is equally affected by jihadi terrorism and the potential threat of returning foreign fighters. He mentions that specifically France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy share a similar problematic. Despite being the founding fathers and economic engines of the European Union, they also count with a history of mismanaged integration of immigrant populations they had attracted in the 1950s and 60s, which can be seen as a root cause for the social marginalisation and radicalisation witnessed in these countries today.
The ECTC official renounces the criticism Belgian authorities have faced by news media over their alleged lack of intelligence sharing in light of recent attacks. He asserts that at a policy level, Belgium had long learnt its lesson and, recognising the immense scale of the terrorist threat compared to the small size of the country, has been at the forefront of information exchange. While multiple terabytes of information were made available to Europol after the Paris attacks, even more intelligence was shared following the Brussels attacks in March 2016. According to the interviewee, the core information dealt with within the Taskforce Fraternité has derived from Belgium. Meanwhile, the UK and France remain outside formal multilateral information exchange as they count with their own powerful intelligence structures, while other Member States are not as affected by the foreign fighter problematic and are thus understandably less engaged at the ECTC. He emphasizes that the centre merely offers assistance to countries that need for counter-terrorism assistance, rather than being an obligatory forum for all Member States. He further explains the lack of participation by British counter-terrorism authorities by the fact that Europol currently does not hold the mandate for confidential or classified information to be processed or analysed. This is a major obstacle for intelligence from UK agencies to be sent as counter-terrorism files at national level always carry either of these markings. He also confirms that the infrastructure of the UK security services are far more advanced than others in Europe, and thus tend to rely on their own capabilities, or collaborate within the regime of the Five Eyes181. In general, he describes the United States intelligence apparatus as “a huge
third party lingering over counterterrorism, whose resources dwarf ours by far”. He thus agrees with Aldrich and van Buuren insofar as national counterterrorism units in Europe continue to prioritise bilateral collaboration with the US over multilateral sharing through Europol. A notable example of this is the approach between Belgium and the United States shortly after the Brussels attack, signing an agreement to establish bilateral intelligence cooperation.182
181 The Five Eyes are a historic alliance of the intelligence agencies of the United States, New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom. It was established by formal agreement in 1946, after the exchange of intelligence between the US and UK had proven crucial during World War II. It continues to constitute the basis for signal intelligence cooperation between these countries today.
Asked why former major focusing events, such as 9/11, Madrid 2004 or London 2005 had not created a trigger as strong as the recent attacks to pave the way for establishing a counter-terrorism hub similar to today’s ECTC, the interviewee points to the sheer size of the problem currently at hand. He agrees that terrorism has always been on the agenda of policymakers, but mostly constituted a national problem, in particular with regards to ETA in Spain or the RAF in Germany. Before 9/11, Islamist terrorist cells and networks were relatively small and not as widely spread across Europe as they are now. According to him, the main factor is the unprecedented number of foreign fighters that radicalise in Europe and become subject to terrorist training in war zones in the Middle East. While the phenomenon is not new, the number of FTFs has increased from a few hundred to up to 7,000 Europeans now believed to have departed to support Islamic State and other radical Islamist groups. This problem is rooted in deeper societal problems of those Member States known as the founding fathers and economic engines of the EU, which now find themselves at the forefront of the terrorist threat. Returning foreign fighters indoctrinated to commit terrorist attacks on European soil, as well as radicalised youngsters who remain in their home countries, constitute a severe threat to EU internal security.