EU states share web terrorism monitoring

Brussels, May 31: European Union states have started sharing monitoring of Islamic militant websites, communicating their work via a highly secured information portal, the bloc's police agency's chief said today.

Germany is leading shared EU work of analysing al Qaeda's media arm as-Sahab, according to a statement agreed by EU ambassadors today.

Police say the Internet has taken on huge importance for militant groups, enabling them to share know-how and spread propaganda to a mass audience, and to plan operations.

''We offer EU member states to share their responsibilities in checking the web,'' Europol's director Max-Peter Ratzel said in a phone interview, referring to an information portal he said the police agency launched earlier this month.

''It's for Islamic terrorism,'' Ratzel said of the site accessible to a maximum of five experts in each EU state.

''If you see that a website is checked by another country, you can save the energy,'' he said.

The portal is to include a list of links of monitored Web sites, statements by terrorist organisations, and details on experts checking the web in EU countries, including their language competence and technical expertise.

Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency, has been pressing the 27 EU states to cooperate on web monitoring, arguing that not all member states have experts who can translate and analyse Web sites used by militants.

''At present some member states under German lead responsibility are sharing the task of analysing al Qaeda's media department as-Sahab,'' according to the statement agreed by EU ambassadors today.

As-Sahab's output has included a series of statements by its senior leaders.

Western security analysts say al Qaeda and its offshoots have been very adept at using new media, publishing footage of violent executions and attacks on British forces in Iraq on the Internet within hours of them happening.

''Internet use plays a major role in the logistic, operational and communication network of terrorist organisations,'' said the statement, prepared for the next meeting of EU justice and interior ministers in June said.

''Terrorists use the Internet not only as a means to communicate and spread propaganda, but also to radicalise, recruit and train terrorists, to spread instructions on how to carry out concrete offences and to transfer covert information,'' it said.

''The systematic cooperation in sharing the task of monitoring and assessing the Internet needs to be further strengthened,'' the statement said.

Reuters>