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The United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism Centre of the United Nations Office of Counter-Terrorism (UNCCT/UNOCT) will hold a High-Level Briefing to present the results and perspectives of capacity-building initiatives to counter terrorist use of weapons in Africa and Central Asia, at the United Nations Headquarter in New York on 23 October from 1:15 PM.

The increasing turnover and diversion of small arms and light weapons (SALW) to terrorists, the growing prevalence of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in terrorist attacks, and the emerging issue of the use of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) by terrorists are particularly concerning trends and developments – both old and new – that represent a serious threat to international peace and security.

In light of the above, the United Nations Security Council, through resolution 2370 (2017), and the United Nations General Assembly, through resolution 77/298 (2023) on the Eighth Review of the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, call upon Member States to take measures to eliminate the supply of weapons to terrorists.

To contribute to these efforts, in 2019, UNOCT partnered with the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate (CTED) and the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) to develop technical guidelines on addressing the terrorist use of SALW, IEDs and UAS, to support Member States in the implementation of the United Nations Security Council resolution 2370 (2017). To date, the guidelines have been promoted by UNOCT in more than 40 Member States.

In addition, since 2020, UNOCT, with the support of the Russian Federation, has been working on several initiatives to tackle these issues in Africa and Central Asia. Most recently, the project on Building capacity in the field of eliminating the supply of weapons to terrorists in Africa (2023-2024), brought together over 100 officials from 16 Member States of East Africa and the Sahel, as well as 15 international and regional organizations. Building on these results, UNOCT is launching a new initiative to develop tailored technical guidelines for Central Asia.