India has urged the international community to reject double standards in combating terrorism, asserting that there can be no justification for terror "irrespective of any grievance, political cause or strategic calculation."
Addressing the UN General Assembly during the adoption of the Ninth Review of the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy (GCTS) on Wednesday, India's Permanent Representative to the UN, Ambassador Harish Parvathaneni, called for collective action to eliminate the "murderous ideology" driving terrorism.
"India has been a victim of cross-border terrorism for decades. Our people have paid the price of terrorism in lives lost, families scarred, and societies shattered. This experience has shaped India's approach: there can be no justification for terrorism," Parvathaneni said.
"Irrespective of any grievance, political cause or strategic calculation, terrorism in all its forms and manifestations must be condemned unequivocally," he added.
Stressing the need for accountability, Parvathaneni said perpetrators, organisers, financiers and sponsors of terrorism must be brought to justice, with member states extending full cooperation.
"A terrorist is a terrorist!! We must work hand in hand to root out the murderous ideology without finding any grievance to justify terrorism," he said.
India also cautioned against politicising counter-terrorism efforts.
"Counter-terrorism should not be hollowed out by false equivalences or politicised narratives. We must address the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism, but we must never confuse context with justification. We must uphold human rights and the rule of law, but we must also recognise that the first human right is the right to life, and terrorism is the most direct assault on this human right," Parvathaneni said.
On terror financing, India stressed that disrupting financial networks must remain central to global counter-terrorism efforts.
"The international community must improve financial intelligence sharing, strengthen implementation of Financial Action Task Force standards, and ensure that no jurisdiction remains a safe conduit for terror financing," he said.
India also flagged the growing misuse of emerging technologies by terrorist groups, expressing disappointment that the latest GCTS review failed to reach consensus on preventing terrorists from exploiting such technologies.
"It is disheartening that negotiations of this review of the GCTS were not able to reach an acceptable landing point on the crucial issue of ensuring that terrorists are denied the technological tools for their nefarious acts," Parvathaneni said.
The envoy noted that the latest review comes 20 years after member states adopted the GCTS, reaffirming that terrorism is a global threat requiring international cooperation.
Recalling that India had proposed the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT) even before the GCTS was adopted in 2006, Parvathaneni said the absence of a universally accepted legal framework continues to hamper collective efforts.
"This legal instrument is essential to close normative gaps, strengthen prosecution and extradition, and deny terrorists and their sponsors access to safe havens, funds and arms," he said.
"Nearly three decades of delay have hindered our collective efforts to combat terrorism. The time has come to demonstrate political will to conclude the CCIT," he added.
Highlighting India's contributions to global counter-terrorism initiatives, Parvathaneni referred to the Delhi Declaration on countering the use of new and emerging technologies for terrorist purposes and the No Money for Terror Conferences.
He criticised the omission of the Delhi Declaration from the review, saying it "reflects the unfortunate situation of how this Assembly is held hostage to petty bean counting! It is doubly unfortunate when the international community continues to tolerate this behaviour."
Reiterating India's stand against religious hatred, Parvathaneni said the country condemns all acts motivated by prejudice against any faith or identity.
"As this is the United Nations, a multilateral forum of universal membership, our lens too should be universal. While we condemn all acts motivated by Islamophobia, Christianphobia and antisemitism, this august body must acknowledge that such phobias extend to other faiths as well," he said.
Concluding his remarks, Parvathaneni underlined that meaningful global cooperation remains the key to defeating terrorism.
"Only if we have the political will to counter it in all its manifestations; Only if there are no double standards; Only if there is no distinction between good or bad terrorists."
"Only if there is transparency and objectivity in the way sanctions regimes function to secure listings of genuine and evidence-based objective listing proposals; Only if exclusivist frameworks, new terminologies and false priorities are thwarted, could the menace of terrorism be successfully combatted by us together," he said.
(With inputs from PTI)
