Mr. Chairman,

India attaches the highest importance to the present agenda item relating to "Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism" and has been raising this issue at the United Nations and other international forums for the last several years.

As the Prime Minister of India stressed on September 24, 1998 in his statement in the general debate during this session, terrorism is a crime against humanity. It is a scourge that open democratic societies have to contend with and the challenge is to maintain our openness, safeguard individual rights, and, at the same time, give no quarter to terrorists. Terrorism is one threat that affects us all equally. Terrorism takes a daily toll across the world. It is the most vicious among international crimes, the most pervasive, pernicious and ruthless threat to the lives of men and women in open societies and to international peace and security. Its tentacles have spread across the world. Today, it has linkages with illicit trade in drugs, arms and money laundering. In short, terrorism has gone global. It can only be defeated by organized international action and it should be the primary task of all open and plural societies to develop collective means for tackling this menace of terrorism.

Mr. Chairman, at its summit meeting in Durban, the Non-Aligned Movement has called for an international conference on terrorism in 1999 to develop such a collective response. We urge that the 1999 conference launch the process of negotiations to provide for collective action against States and organizations, which initiate or aid and abet terrorism.

The United Nations took the first significant step in its fight against terrorism with its 1994 Declaration on Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism. It unequivocally condemned terrorism and stipulated that all States must recognize that acts of terrorism are criminal and cannot be justified under any circumstances. States are clearly obliged to refrain from organizing, instigating, assisting or participating in terrorist acts in the territories of other States, and acquiescing in or encouraging activities within their territories directed towards the commission of such acts. States are also obliged to ensure that their territories are not used for terrorist installations or training camps or for the preparation or organization of terrorist acts intended to be committed against other States or their citizens. Acts of terrorism cannot be justified on political, philosophical, ideological, racial, ethnic, religious or any other consideration. The standards set in the 1994 Declaration will continue to be relevant as long as some States and groups continue to sponsor, finance and provide arms to terrorists. It is necessary to sincerely implement the Declaration and to effectively operationalise the standards it set.

Resolution 51/210 adopted by the General Assembly during its 51st session decided to establish an Ad hoc committee on terrorism with a mandate to elaborate, first, a convention for the suppression of terrorist bombings, second, a convention for the suppression of acts of nuclear terrorism, and finally, a comprehensive legal framework on international terrorism. We supported this approach as representing a package whose ultimate aim is to ensure a comprehensive convention against international terrorism.

Mr. Chairman, the first step in the above plan was completed with the adoption of the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings by the General Assembly on 15 December 1997. On the second step in this process, we welcome and commend the initiative taken by the Russian Federation to present a draft text for the Convention against Nuclear Terrorism. The Ad hoc Committee on terrorism, which met earlier this year, and was chaired by Mr. Phillippe Kirsch of Canada, made significant progress on the draft. The Working Group of the Sixth Committee met in the beginning of the current session to continue the work of the Ad hoc Committee and has reached agreement on most of the provisions of the Draft Convention against Nuclear Terrorism. The only outstanding issue relates to the scope of the Convention. We strongly favor the early adoption of the Convention against Nuclear Terrorism and urge that the outstanding issues be quickly resolved in a spirit of accommodation and in the overall interests of realizing the ultimate goal of elimination of terrorism.

Mr. Chairman, we believe that the outstanding issues on the Convention against Nuclear Terrorism should not delay the third step of Resolution 51/210, the elaboration of a comprehensive convention on international terrorism. India has already furnished to the United Nations a draft text for such a comprehensive convention, circulated as document A/C.6/51/6. This draft, which is being revised and updated, could form a basis for negotiations.