United Nations: The chance of the use of weaponised drones for terrorist actions towards strategic and industrial property calls for serious consideration by the worldwide neighborhood, India has advised the UN General Assembly, a day after two explosives-laden drones crashed into the Indian Air Force (IAF) station at Jammu airport.
A contemporary try and assault a army set up with the assistance of drones was foiled by alert Army sentries at the Ratnuchak-Kaluchak station who fired at the unmanned aerial autos that flew away, an incident that got here hours after an IAF station noticed the primary terror assault utilizing quadcopters.
The first drone was noticed at round 11.45 pm on Sunday adopted by one other at 2.40 am over the army station, which witnessed a terror assault in 2002 during which 31 individuals had been killed, together with 10 youngsters. The IAF assault is the primary occasion of suspected Pakistan-based terrorists deploying drones to strike at the nation’s important installations.
“Today, misuse of information and communication technology such as internet and social media for terrorist propaganda, radicalisation and recruitment of cadre; misuse of new payment methods and crowdfunding platforms for the financing of terrorism; and misuse of emerging technologies for terrorist purposes have emerged as the most serious threats of terrorism and will decide the counter-terrorism paradigm going forward,” Special Secretary (Internal Security), Ministry of Home Affairs within the Government of India, V S Ok Kaumudi mentioned.
Speaking at the “Global scourge of terrorism: assessment of current threats and emerging trends for the new decade’, he said, “one other add-on” to “current worries” is the use of drones.
“Being a low-cost possibility and simply accessible, utilisation of these aerial/sub-surface platforms for sinister functions by terrorist teams equivalent to intelligence assortment, weapon/explosives supply and focused assaults have develop into an imminent hazard and problem for safety businesses worldwide,? he mentioned at the 2nd High-Level Conference of the Head of Counter-Terrorism Agencies of the Member States within the General Assembly.
“The possibility of the use of weaponised drones for terrorist purposes against strategic and commercial assets calls for serious attention by the member states. We have witnessed terrorists using UAS to smuggle weapons across borders,” Kaumudi mentioned, in accordance with his assertion issued by the Permanent Mission of India to the UN.
Kaumudi mentioned the COVID-19 pandemic and the following isolation have additional accentuated the influence of the web on individuals making them weak to radicalisation and recruitment by terrorist teams.
Spreading terrorist propaganda via the use of “indulging video games” is one other technique that was deployed by terrorist teams throughout the pandemic, he mentioned.
“It is imperative for countries to adopt a multi-pronged approach to tackle the global threats emanating out of misuse of new technologies particularly aiming towards terrorism and violent extremism conducive to terrorism,” he mentioned.
India referred to as on the world to stay united towards tendencies of labelling terrorism primarily based on terrorist motivations particularly these primarily based on faith, and political ideologies.
“This will certainly divide us and weaken our fight against terrorism,” Kaumudi mentioned.
He mentioned the transborder nature of this menace calls for collective and unified motion by the worldwide neighborhood, with none excuse or exceptions, guaranteeing that these international locations which give secure havens to terrorists needs to be referred to as out and held accountably.
India famous with concern that web and social media platforms have become indispensable sources within the toolkit of international terrorist teams for spreading terrorist propaganda and conspiracy theories aimed at spreading hatred amongst societies and communities and provide extra radicalisation alternatives which can proliferate globally.
“The increased use of closed group communications adds to the concern,” he mentioned.
Kaumudi advised the General Assembly that persevering with developments in evolving applied sciences, equivalent to Artificial Intelligence, robotics, ‘deep fakes’, blockchain, darkish net are fraught with the chance of being abused by terrorists. “Already, cryptocurrencies, virtual assets, crowdfunding platforms are helping terror financing, owing to anonymity and un-traceability of these technologies,” he mentioned.
India has put in place an elaborate counter-terrorism and safety structure, in addition to introducing a sequence of measures within the cyber-space encapsulating counter-radicalisation and de-radicalisation methods.
(Inputs from company)
