Jihadi-motivated terrorism is still considered the most serious terrorist threat in the European Union - reports Europol in its latest report - Magyar Nemzet reports.
The European Union Terrorism Situation and Trend Report 2021, the document published by the European Union's law enforcement agency the other day, aims to provide fresh data on the state of terrorism and its prospects, especially in the EU based on information from Member States.
The document draws attention to the fact that last year public opinion and political decision-makers were tied up by the measures related to the coronavirus epidemic, but a number of tragic cases show that - even despite the global health situation - terrorism still poses a threat to the old continent.
Looking at the data, the situation is worrying: a total of 57 acts of terrorism took place in the EU countries last year, two more in Switzerland, and 62 terrorist-related cases took place in the United Kingdom. The report highlights that together with the completed, failed or exposed acts, a total of 449 persons were arrested by the authorities on suspicion of terrorism in the European Union. A total of 21 people were killed in terrorist attacks, with three deaths in the UK and one in Switzerland.
According to the document, authorities concluded that the victims of the attacks were, with one exception, randomly selected.
An exception was the case of the murder of the French high school teacher: on October 16 last year, in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, France, 18-year-old Abdoullakh Anzorov , Allah akbar! high school history teacher Samuel Paty , of French origin By the way, the latest terrorist attack in the country took place this year in Rambouillet near Paris: a man from Tunisia fatally stabbed a French policewoman, Allah akbar! exclaiming…
... It is a challenge for us to take up the fight against those who, for religious reasons, deviate from the normal functioning of society - - declared Macron last October, when he announced the law. He then added: since 2012, the French have been victims of Islamist terror from time to time; it was time for society to slowly arm itself against the threat. Among other things, the law punishes those who publish personal data on social networking sites in such a way as to endanger the lives of others.
Europol's report also addresses this above-mentioned phenomenon:
…The document details that jihadist terrorists are often lone perpetrators and are characterized by simple methods of attack: apart from the Vienna incident, where firearms were also used, the perpetrators usually attack with knives. In almost all cases, the perpetrators are men between the ages of 18 and 33. Also noteworthy is the fact that in four out of ten jihadist-motivated attacks, the perpetrators were EU citizens.
In five out of ten cases, the perpetrators came from the ranks of asylum seekers and illegal immigrants...
The full article can be read here.
(Header image: MTI)
