Thought Papers

Jean Louis Bruguiere

Former Judge, EU Anti- Terrorism Court

Tracking Terror Funding in the EU

The financial dimension of a terrorist threat remains relatively unknown. In fact, the topic of terrorism financing is often neglected and not given much attention in terrorism discourse. This is a big mistake because financing plays a very important role, especially right now. Perhaps we don’t pay too much attention because the financial figures are relatively modest and don’t run in the billions. Financing terrorism is cheap, as costs are low. The financial aspect of terror is now slowly garnering attention because it is a crucial aspect to consider. If you don’t have money you can’t carry out any operations. Even 100 dollars are important, and it’s necessary to track and watch the flow of finances. We don’t have proper borders in several places, and this means that terrorism funds can be acquired in one country and later change hands in another country. This makes the exercise of tracking the funds very difficult.