1. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) will co-host the “Asia Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Counter-Terrorism Dialogue” on Jeju Island from May 29 to 30.

o The upcoming meeting, the first counter-terrorism meeting to be co-hosted in the ROK with the UN counter-terrorism organization, will bring together about 50 people, including government delegates from the US, Japan, Bangladesh, and Malaysia, as well as private sector experts and representatives from related companies. The participants will focus their discussions on cases where ICTs have been misused by terrorist groups in Asia, exemplary practices in responses, and regulations to prevent the misuse of ICTs by terrorist groups.

2. As terrorist groups are increasingly using the Internet and SNS to spread extremist ideologies, recruit terrorist fighters, mobilize financial resources, and plot and launch terrorist attacks, preventing the misuse of ICTs by terrorist groups has become an important agenda in the international community’s counter-terrorism efforts. The Foreign Ministry and the CTED have decided to hold the meeting to review Asia’s vulnerabilities and explore ways for the region to address them.

o The forthcoming meeting will be the first in a series of three meetings on the issue to be co-hosted with the UN CTED. The second and third meetings will take place in other Asian countries next year.

3. In an effort to prepare for the growing terror threats in the international community, the ROK government has established various bilateral, regional and multilateral consultation channels and cooperation networks, including by holding bilateral and trilateral counter-terrorism consultations, participating in mechanisms for counter-terrorism cooperation in Asia, such as the ARF and the EAS, and building networks with the UN counter-terrorism organization. The ROK, as a leader in ICT, will continue to actively support cooperation on related issues among Asian countries and with the UN.

o As the upcoming meeting comes after the “seminar on ways to build regional capacity for preventing and responding to violent extremism in East Asia” in December last year and the “Inter-Regional Conference on Cyber/ICT Security” in April this year, which the ROK co-hosted with Indonesia and the OSCE, respectively, the meeting is expected to serve as an opportunity to further increase the ROK’s contribution to regional and international efforts to prevent and respond to violent extremism in Asia.


* unofficial translation