Opinions & Interviews

MINSK, 9 October (BelTA) - Belarus is in keeping with global and national security trends and will always make its contribution to the solution of global and regional problems, State Secretary of the Belarusian Security Council Stanislav Zas said at the opening of the international high-level conference “Preventing and Countering Terrorism in the Digital Age" in Minsk on 9 October, BelTA has learned.

“These are not just fine words but the policy of Belarus,” he said.

The history of Belarus does not allow it to disregard security issues. “Peace, good-neighborliness and trust are important for us. This is why Belarus is a consistent supporter of the broadest possible cooperation to reduce global and regional risks, challenges and threats to international security, including those related to terrorism, extremism, transnational crime,” Stanislav Zas noted.

He noted that with the advent of digital technologies, the world has confronted with a new phenomenon - cyber terrorism. International criminals have received a powerful and relatively affordable instrument of warfare, means for hacking networks, manipulating financial and personal information. Information technologies in the hands of terrorists constitute a new threat to society and the state, Stanislav Zas noted.

The development of cooperation between countries in matters of international regulation of behavior in the information sector and the prevention of the use of modern technologies for criminal purposes acquires special importance. “We need to ensure cooperation and information sharing between special services and law enforcement agencies, comprehensive partnership between the state, civil society and business,” Stanislav Zas said. In this regard, he took note of the importance of the international high-level conference “Preventing and Countering Terrorism in the Digital Age" in Minsk on 9-10 October.

The conference will feature three sessions. The first session “Implementing the OSCE conceptual framework for countering terrorism in the digital age” will focus on the progress and challenges related to the implementation of OSCE commitments to combat terrorism and relevant mandates. The second session will discuss the value of public-private partnerships in preventing and countering terrorism online. The focus will be on the experience and best practices, possible priority areas for strengthening public-private cooperation, including in relation to the strategic areas of the OSCE counter-terrorism activities. The topic of the third session is “Protection of critical infrastructure from terrorist attacks emanating from cyberspace”. The session will also provide an opportunity for other international organizations to report to the OSCE about their efforts.

Participants of the side event "Collection, use and sharing of evidence for the purpose of criminal prosecution in terrorism cases" will get acquainted with a practical guide on digital evidence requests and collection developed by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Terrorism Prevention Branch in partnership with the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) and the International Association of Prosecutors (IAP) and will ask the authors questions about the document, its objectives, functions and content.

Attending the conference are representatives of the OSCE member countries, partner countries, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) leadership, business community, think tanks and Chairman of the CIS Executive Committee, CIS Executive Secretary Sergei Lebedev. Belarus will also host senior officials of the OSCE, the UN Counter-Terrorism Office and the UNODC.

The organizers of the conference are Belarus’ Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).