On the evening of 13 November 2015 three teams of terrorists, operating separately, committed a series of coordinated attacks with automatic rifles and explosives in a stadium, concert hall and at a number of restaurants and bars in Paris. The attacks were deliberately meant to kill and injure as many civilians as possible, and caused the death of 130 people, wounding 368. The so-called Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility for the attacks, saying that they were committed in retaliation for the French airstrikes on IS targets in Syria and Iraq.
The attacks raised the question of whether IS is changing its prime focus from seizing territory and local resources to more global goals. Its involvement in international terrorism against the West was, until November, limited to attacks on tourists in Muslim-majority countries, and inspiring individuals in Europe to perpetrate lone-actor terrorist attacks. This apparent shift of focus of IS, and also the activities of other terrorist groups threatening the safety of the EU, is closely monitored by counter terrorism experts from EU Member States, supported by Europol specialists and analysts. The overall purpose of these efforts is to make timely interventions possible, and to react effectively to any terrorist activities.
One issue closely linked to IS and religiously inspired terrorism in general, and deserving special attention, is that of returning foreign fighters. The November Paris attacks have once again demonstrated that young Europeans, having returned from Syria and other conflict areas where they had joined rebel groups, are of serious concern for the EU. Several of the Paris attackers, and people around them, had been to Syria before.
Europol activated the Emergency Response Team (EMRT) immediately after the 13 November 2015 Paris attacks, to support the investigations on a 24/7 basis. Europol counter terrorism (CT) experts, analysts and French and Belgian colleagues worked round the clock to assist from Europol offices in The Hague and on the spot where investigations were taking place. They analysed an enormous amount of data generated by the criminal investigations being carried out in both countries. Altogether five mobile offices with staff members were deployed in Belgium, Paris and Lyon (Interpol) to assist French and Belgian investigators. This included expert Arabic language support from Europol’s Internet Referral Unit.
Europol was able to demonstrate its ability to respond quickly and effectively to support counter-terrorism and criminal investigations whenever a major terrorist incident may require the investigations to have a transnational or international scope.
Fighting terrorism, along with combating serious and organised crime, is Europol’s core business. Europol’s existing CT services have recently been brought together in the European Counter Terrorism Centre (ECTC), staffed by Europol experts and analysts, and operational from 1 January 2016. The ECTC maximises Europol’s operational, technical and intelligence exchange capabilities.
These include monitoring Arab language terrorist websites and social media, and tracking terrorist support networks through information on financial transactions. The EU IRU - Internet Referral Unit – one of the core CT services composing the ECTC, identifies and analyses terrorist content on the internet and social media, and works with private sector companies to remove it.
The ECTC also houses the EU Bomb Data System (EBDS) a platform for the timely sharing of relevant information and intelligence on incidents involving explosives, incendiary and explosive devices, as well as chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) materials.
