Diplomats at the United Nations in New York have their 2025 buzzword: “UN80.” It’s a quintessential U.N.-style acronym for the reform process to mark the 80th anniversary of the U.N. system. While it sounds like a planned and virtuous project, in reality it is a hasty restructuring to balance the books. Considering impending budget cuts from the Trump administration, virtually every part of the U.N. system is being asked to make budget reductions of approximately one third of its operating costs. For the U.N.’s counterterrorism system specifically, an area that has experienced a significant infusion of resources over the past few years, 25 years of institutional growth might be coming to an end. This actually could be positive, if done right.
The UN80 process offers an opportunity to shift sprawling counterterrorism structures that have been overwhelmingly weighted towards hard security into a an approach that fits more comfortably with the U.N.’s core purpose: focusing clearly on its core pillars of peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights and humanitarian affairs. Yet, with all reform processes, there are real risks. Namely, talks of mergers, consolidations, reductions, and relocations might lead to the weakening of the wrong parts of the U.N. counterterrorism system. To guard against this, U.N. member States — and U.N. leadership — should carefully balance proposed reforms with three clear tests:
- Will the changes enable balanced implementation across the four pillars of the U.N.s Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, the guiding mandate for the U.N.’s counterterrorism system;
- Is the new offering rooted in international law, including humanitarian law, international human rights law, and respect for the rule of law — in line with the U.N. Charter and recently reiterated by consensus in the body’s Pact for the Future;
- Is the correct expertise in place to ensure that the counterterrorism work of the U.N. system does not inadvertently support harmful approaches at a national or local level that would negatively impact the U.N.s reputation.
Pieces of the Puzzle
The U.N. counterterrorism architecture is comprised of three main entities. The U.N. Office of Counterterrorism (UNOCT), established in 2017, sits within the U.N. Secretariat and has five core parts to its mandate: 1) leadership on U.N. General Assembly counterterrorism mandates, 2) coordination of counterterrorism activities across the U.N. system, 3) capacity building assistance for member States, 4) resource mobilization, and 5) ensuring that “due priority is given to counterterrorism” across the U.N. system. No part of the U.N. system has grown more quickly than the UNOCT. Beginning with just seven staff members, the contribution from the regular budget swelled 700 percent by 2025, allowing its staff to grow to 60 people. Sold to the U.N. General Assembly’s Administrative and Budgetary Committee (“Fifth Committee”) as a necessary step to put the office on more sustainable financial footing, the increase was only needed because of the influx of huge extrabudgetary resources by Qatar and Saudi Arabia into the counterterrorism work of the U.N. Despite this budget increase, evidence of effectiveness and value for money has been hard to come by.
The U.N. Counter-terrorism Executive Directorate (CTED), a “special political mission “mandated by the U.N. Security Council in 2004, assists the Security Council’s Counter-Terrorism Committee in monitoring the implementation of related council resolutions, as well as conducting in-country visits to assess State compliance with these resolutions. Finally, the Terrorism Prevention Branch (TPB) in the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, the oldest counterterrorism entity set up in 1997, is tasked with providing substantive “capacity-building support” to member States to comply with international instruments on terrorism and delivering law enforcement and criminal justice support to States. In recent years, the Terrorism Prevention Branch has moved towards other counterterrorism work, including efforts to prevent violent extremism.
There have been many criticisms of the work of the U.N. counterterrorism system over the past few years – from U.N. member States, independent U.N. experts, U.N. entities themselves, and civil society (including some by this author). Many have questioned the work of the three main offices for their lack of engagement with civil society, focus on people-centered security or the lack of prioritization of human rights and gender in activities. Some have noted the risks – and evidence — that the U.N. counterterrorism structures and approaches too often and unnecessarily violate human rights and contribute to the closing space for civil society organizations to operate.
Oversight of the work of the wider U.N. counterterrorism system has also been severely lacking. Different parts have been criticized for working with and supporting authorities that have wielded counterterrorism mechanisms to target civil society groups, religious minorities or political opponents. Many stakeholders — U.N. member States included — have pushed for better transparency within the U.N. counterterrorism architecture. Some have been concerned that the U.N.’s counterterrorism efforts have followed funds, rather than Security Council or General Assembly mandates or the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy.
The current U.N. reform process — and member States involved in it — should then take all of these experiences into account.
UN80 as It Stands
Following the leak in early May of an internal document from the U.N. task force working on UN80, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres indicated plans for the “consolidation within UNOCT of all counter-terrorism activities spread in the system.” Specifically, these include:
- Mergers: A potential merging of the Terrorism Prevention Branch with UNOCT is clearly in the cards in an attempt to reduce duplication and streamline mandates.
- Consolidations and reductions: Failing a full merger in the event of opposition from some member States, different parts of the counterterrorism mandates might be consolidated or reduced. For UNOCT, given its recent speedy growth and its cost to the regular budget, a reduction could be likely. A decision on CTED, an entity that exists as a result of U.N. Security Council resolutions, might be made as part of the renewal process of that mandate in December 2025.
- Relocations: By the end of 2026, New York may no longer be the home of the U.N.’s counterterrorism system. Transferring New York-based staff and offices to other U.N. locations could represent significant cost savings. Diplomatic chatter indicates that some U.N. member States — Turkey and Kuwait, for instance — have used this crisis moment as an opportunity to suggest hosting parts of the U.N. counterterrorism system in their countries.
Guidance for Reform
For U.N. member States wishing to see the U.N. counterterrorism mechanisms work more responsibly and effectively, the following three points should be seen as useful guidance:
Mergers With a Purpose
A merger of U.N. counterterrorism entities risks diluting some of the strengths of the system, rather than improving it. While the mandates of the Terrorism Prevention Branch and UNOCT are not so incompatible, a merger still might not be an advisable move. A June 2024 research paper I co-authored for my organization, Saferworld, reviewed the strengths and weaknesses of the Terrorism Prevention Branch. While we noted many areas where improvement is required, we found that the branch’s value comes from strong expertise among its personnel in criminal justice and rule of law, with some clear examples of relevant and impactful work. Merging these functions into UNOCT — an office with a significantly different culture and background — might lead to the loss of such expertise.
Similarly, any attempt to merge CTED — given its status as a special political mission serving a U.N. Security Council committee — with a Secretariat office will create significant challenges. CTEDs country-assessment visits are closely guarded and, despite pushes by many in civil society for better transparency, remain almost entirely closed. These country assessments provide information about States’ compliance with U.N. Security Council resolutions related to counterterrorism and other gaps or shortcomings, so there is a logical argument for better coordination of these findings across the U.N. counterterrorism system. Yet many other practicalities make a merger hard to fathom.
Protecting Core Functions and Reducing the Potential for Harm
UNOCT cannot — and should not — be the home for all parts of the U.N.’s work related to counterterrorism. The majority of terror attacks occur in conflict-affected areas, and so the best offer the U.N. can make on counterterrorism is investing in prevention and strategies to address the rise of violent conflict. That means parts of the U.N. counterterrorism system should support the U.N.s work on conflict prevention and peacebuilding, rather than the other way around.
Additionally, human rights-related expertise should be part of what counterterrorism mechanisms offer, but it can in no way make up for the human rights leadership and mandate of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). Saferworld’s research has shown that too often the human rights functions that sit within U.N. counterterrorism entities are deprioritized and narrowly focused on minimal compliance with U.N. policies.
Similarly, the U.N.’s counterterrorism work related to gender — which is a key part of the U.N. Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy — cannot all be integrated within UNOCT. Ensuring UN Women remains a lead is vital to ensuring that this issue is prioritized and is the best way of maintaining a focus on the serious risks (such as reprisals and targeting) facing women-led organizations and women’s rights defenders. While it is essential that UNOCT maintains its gender and human rights expertise, these should be complementary to the institutional mandate holders — UN Women and OHCHR — rather than becoming the sole home for this work in the U.N. system. All U.N. agencies working on counterterrorism — including UNOCT — should be integrating human rights and gender perspectives into their strategies, approaches, and programs to ensure the specific needs and roles are accounted for. But if OHCHR’s and UN Women’s work related to counterterrorism is not protected, the U.N. system will lose an important accountability function, and its overall effectiveness will be diminished.
Keep Reductions in Line with Core Mandates
Underpinning the reform options that have been presented for the U.N. counterterrorism system is an acknowledgement that mandates are split across the U.N. system. In that sense, streamlining mandates related to counterterrorism to coordinate such work across U.N. organizations and programs does make sense. For the OCT, a re-examination of its mandate would be a worthwhile exercise. Offering policy guidance to the wider U.N. system and to member States and delivering accurate, transparent and timely reporting to States are all functions that should be prioritized (though it sounds basic, that has rarely happened). Beyond that, member States should be open to a conversation about what they are really getting from the rest of OCTs mandate and whether the various events, special projects, and high-level conferences represent value for money. For the Terrorism Prevention Branch, the reality is that there is little clarity about the true effectiveness of its capacity building and programming. For example, evaluations of the Terrorism Prevention Branch’s programming measure management success and outputs but cannot indicate actual outcomes (changes that have occurred as a result of the branch’s work) or whether “terrorism” is being prevented. Finally for CTED, the U.N. Security Council will need to negotiate a new mandate by the end of 2025 and make a similar assessment.
What Next?
Revised estimates for the U.N.’s program budget for the 2026 calendar year will be presented to U.N. member States in September. States will then negotiate a final 2026 budget by the end of 2025. Further reductions are likely to come during the 2027 budget process next year. There is a risk that moving a major reform so quickly will undermine the work of the U.N. Yet, for those member States that have raised skepticism about the fast growth of the counterterrorism architecture, this reform presents an opportunity to help push for some much-needed changes.
Rightsizing the U.N. counterterrorism system has the potential to create a more streamlined approach for States and communities around the world. It is critical that the new system carries out balanced implementation of the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, with a grounding in international law and with respect for human rights and the rule of law. This would hopefully be more people-centered, and less focused on hard security and more on the needs of people, rather than what one donor State wishes to do to burnish its image in New York. Such a system ultimately will benefit all those who care about ensuring the U.N. overall serves the world as it is intended to do.
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