Page 28 - Cyber Terrorism and Extremism as Threat to Critical Infrastructure Protection

SECTION I: EXTREMISM, RADICALIZATION AND CYBER THREATS AS AN IMPORTANT
SECURITY FACTORS FOR COUNTERING TERRORISM PROCESSES

violent crimes on behalf of an extremist group. The conviction rate is around 98%” (Taub,
2018, e-source). Prisoners have been put together in small rooms, in inhumane conditions, with
families afraid to visit them because of the fear of being put to trial themselves.

The main part of the research of this article involves foreign fighters that have returned to
their countries of origin, alone or with the help of others. Cases of returning foreign fighters
clearly show that, for most foreign fighters (for those who return have been registered), after
their return comes custody and an investigation that leads to a trial. Foreign fighters give
themselves up or are reported by family members or friends. There is also the possibility that
governments find them when they want to return through state borders. At the moment most
countries arrest suspects, and they then look for evidence to be able to put the returning for-
eign fighter to trial. In the past few years, even those countries which had anti-terrorist laws
before, and where those laws included a section on joining foreign military formations, have
begun to drastically tighten their laws to be able to put foreign fighters behind bars.

Punishments depend on the law of each country individually, and all the possible crimes that
have been committed by returning foreign fighters have been prosecuted by local rather than
international laws. However, as a European Parliament briefing of 2015 stated, “With all
EU Member States having ratified and implemented the Rome Statute of the International
Criminal Court (ICC), foreign fighters could be made accountable for ‘international crimes’
(war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide) committed outside EU borders (within
the limits of the ICC’s jurisdiction though, which is not universal)... As to ‘ordinary’ and
terrorism-related offences (defined in criminal codes or specific counter-terrorism legisla-
tion), they may be prosecuted by individual Member States under condition that the offence
has been committed on their territory (principle of territoriality), by their nationals (active
nationality principle) or against their nationals (passive nationality principle)... In line with
the Council Framework Decision 2008/919/JHA (‘FD 2008’), national criminal laws cover
a series of terrorism-related offences. Those include participation in a terrorist group, public
incitement to commit a terrorist crime, recruiting terrorists and providing training to them.
Some countries − such as Belgium and Germany − have gone a step further and criminalized
receiving such training. The use of these provisions to prosecute individual foreign fighters
seems problematic, as travelling to a conflict area is normally not a crime per se, unless there
are grounds to prove an attempt at committing a specific offence” (Europarl, 2015, p 7). Un-
fortunately, though, “Another trend that can be identified is that the penalties for crimes are
not standardized and thus the sentences for crimes are not uniform across states, even where
conduct is arguably similar. Indeed, UNSC Resolution 2178 only requires that States “estab-
lish serious criminal offences sufficient to provide the ability to prosecute and to penalize
in a manner duly reflecting the seriousness of the offence” thus leaving the actual penalties
entirely to the discretion of States (Paulussen and Pitcher, 2018, p 22).

Even countries that are members of the EU do not have standardized punishments, and not
even a standardized way of prosecuting foreign fighters. The EU has tried to standardize this
process of prosecution of foreign fighters by adopting additional regulatory framework. Still,
we are left with questions such as what to do about people who left for Syria as the partner of
a foreign fighter, or what will happen to children who are born there? Is it necessary to make
a distinction between people who participated in the Islamic State as chefs or drivers, helping
the organization in a supporting role, and those who were military personnel of the Islamic
state? Iraq’s Anti-Terrorism Law (Law no. 13 of 2005) is very strict when it comes to this

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