UPDATE Advanced Summer Programme on Countering Terrorism: Roundtable discussion on the ‘exodus’ of European Jihadists to Syria

Advanced Summer Programme on Countering Terrorism in the Post 9/11 World
26 - 30 August 2013, The Hague

The advanced Summer Programme includes a roundtable discussion on the ‘exodus’ of European Jihadists to Syria with high level panellists Sergei Boeke (chair), Amy-Jane Gielen, Maajid Nawaz and Richard Barrett (tbc).

The roundtable will look at the ‘exodus’ of European Jihadists to Syria, a truly international problem and the reason why the Netherlands, for example, has increased the national terrorism threat level to ‘substantial’. Why do European Muslims go to Syria to fight, how are they recruited, what is the risk of these Jihadists when they return to Europe and how can this risk be countered?  

Chair:

Sergei Boeke joined the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism - The Hague as a fellow in February 2013. After completing the Officer training for the Royal Netherlands Navy, he studied law at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, specialising in international and criminal law. After graduation he held several posts in the Navy, serving on different warships and with the Second Marine Battalion, deploying to Southern Iraq in 2003-4. After a short posting as fellow at the Netherlands Institute for International Relations Clingendael, he joined the diplomatic service and worked for the Department of Political Affairs in The Hague. Moving back to the Ministry of Defense in 2008, he was involved in supporting the Dutch comprehensive approach mission in Afghanistan. In 2011, he completed a 9 month training for civil servants at the Ecole Nationale d’Administration (ENA) in Strasbourg, France. His areas of interest include counter-insurgency and counter-terrorism operations, and developments in the AFPAK region, Mali and Nigeria.

Panellists include:

Amy-Jane Gielen is an honors graduate in Political Science, with a specialization in the field of public administration, policy, science and radicalism. An illustration of her expertise in this field is her book published in 2008: Radicalisation and Identity. Radical right-wing and Muslim youth compared. She has also, in collaboration with colleagues from the University of Amsterdam, developed a method to evaluate projects aimed at countering polarization and radicalization. In practice she evaluates several projects on this theme, where she comes into contact with many (young) groups which are often difficult to approach. Finally, she is a guest researcher and teacher at the Political Science Department of the University of Amsterdam.

Maajid Nawaz is a British Pakistani former member of the Islamic political group Hizb ut-Tahrir. He holds a B.A. (Hons) from London University's School of Oriental and African Studies and a M.Sc. in Political Theory from the London School of Economics. Today he is the Executive Director of the Quilliam Foundation, a counter-extremism think tank, created by former activists, including Husain, from radical Islamist organisations.
Nawaz entered the spotlight in 2002 when, as part of a compulsory year abroad as part of his university degree, he travelled to Egypt and was jailed in Alexandria with two others, Ian Nisbet and Reza Pankhurst, for belonging to Hizb ut-Tahrir, a banned organization in Egypt.
During his time in the same prison he spoke at length with the Muslim Brotherhood leadership such as with Mohammed al-Badee’, who in his youth personally smuggled Qutb’s Milestones out from prison, and their spokesman Dr Essam el-Erian. He also befriended Dr Sa'ad al-Din Ibrahim and the imprisoned runner-up to Egypt's 2006 presidential elections, liberal head of the Tomorrow Party, Ayman Nur. Throughout this time, Maajid continued his studies, sitting with graduates of Cairo's Al-Azhar University and Dar al-'Ulum. He specialised in the Arabic language whilst studying historical Muslim scholastics, sources of Islamic jurisprudence, Hadith historiography and the art of Qur'an recitation. He also committed half of the Qur'an to memory.
During his imprisonment in Egypt, Maajid was tortured along with his fellow prisoners. During his trial, Maajid Nawaz was adopted by Amnesty International as a prisoner of conscience.
Since his departure from Hizb-ut-Tahrir, Maajid Nawaz has been active in the Quilliam Foundation. He also writes regularly for UK and international newspapers and speaks at a variety of forums worldwide. On July 11, 2008, he addressed US Senate Homeland Security and Government and Affairs Committee on the subject of Islamist extremism. In January 2009, he attended the Doha Debates alongside other Muslims to debate the threat of political Islam to the West. He presented the Lent Talks on BBC Radio Four on March 10, 2010.

Richard Barrett (tbc) is Senior Director for Special Projects at the Qatar International Academy for Security Studies in Doha. He is also a National Security Fellow at the New America Foundation in Washington and an Adjunct Professor at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio. From March 2004 to December 2012, Richard was Coordinator of the Al-Qaida and Taliban Monitoring Team at the United Nations in New York, appointed by the UN Secretary-General.

In 2005 Richard helped establish a system-wide United Nations working group on terrorism which became the United Nations Counter Terrorism Implementation Task Force following the adoption by the United Nations General Assembly of a Global Strategy to Counter Terrorism in September 2006. Within the Task Force, he led on radicalisation and de-radicalisation issues and on terrorist use of the Internet; he remains an adviser to its Director. Before joining the United Nations, Richard worked for the British Government in the Security Service, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Secret Intelligence Service, where he was in charge of counter terrorism before and after the attacks in the United States in September 2001. He has served in Canada, Jordan, Turkey, and at the United Kingdom Mission to the United Nations in New York.