Links between terrorism and transnational crime groups

Essay from the year 2008 in the subject Politics - Topic: Peace and Conflict Security grade: 13 Macquarie University language: English abstract: Given today''s existence of hundreds of terrorist groups and thousands of criminal ones (Schmid 2005) it is not surprisingly that in some cases a symbiosis between terrorism and organised crime occurred that did not exist before (Laqueur 1999 p. 211). In fact since the early 1990''s Western law enforcement agencies have noted an increased reliance on criminal activities by terrorist groups (Mili 2006 p. 8) a relationship that seems only natural given that terrorism itself is always a crime (Gorka 2000). Hence it is assumed that there is a close connection between international terrorism and transnational organized crime (United Nations Security Council 2001). Some even argue that both criminal activities bleed into one another (Makarenko 2003) and that there is a possibly irreversible trend towards a convergence of these activities (Williams & Sanova 1995 p. 28). In the following this paper will argue that the linkages between criminal and terrorist activities have increased since the end of Cold War in the early 1990''s. However the structure of these linkages is contested in the scholarly debate. In order to find a conclusion this paper will analyze major changes in the structure of terrorist and criminal groups. In a second section the prevailing scenarios of a terrorist-criminal nexus will be outlined and critically discussed.