The European Union's Increasing Role in Foreign Policy Counterterrorism

Since 9/11, the role of the European Union (EU) in counterterrorism has expanded rapidly. Most of the developments were internally derived and would affect only EU Member States and countries on the EU's periphery. However, over the past few years, the EU has become increasingly involved in counterterrorism outside its borders. Although it still has a long way to progress before being recognised as a counterterrorism actor of note, the EU has demonstrated a commitment to include counterterrorism related initiatives into its foreign policies. Analyses of the EU's foreign policy counterterrorism have focused on narrow definitions of foreign policy. It is necessary to distinguish between the external dimension of counterterrorism and foreign policy counterterrorism, and there is a need to combine these in order to better understand the EU as a counterterrorism actor. Foreign policy and counterterrorism therefore need to be broadly defined in order to take account of the full array of EU counterterrorism initiatives. Through the EU's efforts to counter terrorism financing, the EU's role in Afghanistan, the EU-US relationship, and the Commission-based Instrument for Stability (IfS), it will be shown that the EU has made considerable progress towards creating a multi-faceted counterterrorism policy in the nine years since 9/11.