Nowadays, terrorism is one of the most serious problems with which each country is being confronted since the East-West cold war system came to an end. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to effectively cope with it through international cooperation.
I...
Nowadays, terrorism is one of the most serious problems with which each country is being confronted since the East-West cold war system came to an end. Nevertheless, it is very difficult to effectively cope with it through international cooperation.
In South Korea, the government or the people had recognized accidents just committed by countries or foreign bodies except North Korea as terrorism. Therefore there has been insufficient recognition of risk of terrorism since there were relatively few cases of terrorism by foreign bodies or foreigners except for North Korea, and as a countermeasure against it, anti-terrorism duties just based on the 「Guidelines on National Anti-terrorism Activities」(Presidential Instruction No. 47), which was enacted from the decision in 1982 to hold the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, have been conducted. However, the 9/11 terrorist attack became a turning point to reconsider recognition and risk of terrorism all over the world, and as people subsequently recognized that the current legal system is not enough to properly respond to a new form of a threat to national security, a need to legislate the 「Anti-terrorism Act」was presented. However, in the current situation where tangible achievement is not being made, examination and promotion of the 「Anti-terrorism Act(Bill)」suited to our security condition is being urgently required.
Thus this study was attempted to look into institutional inertia of anti-terrorism in our country by investigating the tendency of consolidation of the anti-terrorism act in major countries since the 9/11 terrorist attack, highlight the need to legislate the 「Anti-terrorism Act」by presenting in detail the current status of terrorist threats to our country, and suggest a direction for legislative improvement by examining the major content of the 「Anti-terrorism Act(Bill)」that has been pending in the National Assembly and for and against issues on it, and difference among legislative bills.
To effectively attain the objectives of this study, home and overseas literature and laws related to the research topic were examined, and with this, definition and types of terrorism, content of anti-terrorism bills in each country, and the subsequent purport of legislation were closely examined. In addition, with terrorism-related bills which had been discussed in the National Assembly at the past sessions as well as legislative examples related to anti-terrorism which have been presented by a range of organizations including civic groups, difference among bills and problems were analyzed. Based on this, the researcher tried to propose a model of the 「Anti-terrorism Act(Bill)」most suited to the Korean situations.
The major objective of this study is to investigate subjects and methods for suppression of terrorism through legal and institutional approaches. For this, Section 2 seeks for a measure for mutual cooperation for suppression of terrorism despite difficulty in defining terrorism and examines theoretical background being presented in relation to terrorism as well as issues of organization, concept, preventive function, investigation, punishment, and guarantees of human rights among terrorism-related contents defined under the laws of each advanced country.
Section 3 suggests the current situation of risk of terrorism in our country and the current legislative condition of anti-terrorism, and at the same time examines each issue on these problems.
Section 4 inquires into the major content of the 「Anti-terrorism Act(Bill)」that have been pending in the National Assembly and for and against issues on it, and based on this, proposes a desirable direction for legislation of the「Anti-terrorism Act」 to be efficient in anti-terrorism and discriminate between right and wrong on human rights abuses.
In conclusion, for the 「Anti-terrorism Act」to be enacted herefrom, the objective of enactment should be clearly reestablished. The 「Anti-terrorism Act(Bill)」that has been proposed to date limited the objective of legislation to prevention and countermove against terrorism, and establishment of the system to cope with it.
For this, first of all, concept of terrorism should be newly established.
‘Terrorism’ is an act concretely specified as an act of terrorism so that an individual or a group having political, ideological, religious, and ethnic purposes can pursue the purposes or publish a doctrine or assertion, and the scope should be clarified as an act to make national security or public safety dangerous.
Second, national anti-terrorism organizations should be simplified and relevant organizational systems unified.
For national anti-terrorism organizations including national organs of consultation and deliberation of anti-terrorism policies, a control tower for terrorism-related organs, a council of terrorism-related organs, and an on-the-spot command center upon a terrorism accident, organizational system should be simple to rapidly make a decision and cope with the situation, and command system should be unified for consistent and rapid communication and execution from a national organ of policy consultation to the on-the-spot organization.
In addition, duties and functions of the national anti-terrorism center should be consolidated. Relation between the national anti-terrorism center and the on-the-spot command center and the command system are vague and their horizontal cooperative relation is not clear. To efficiently cope with intelligent and diversified forms of terrorist attacks, a thoroughly consistent response system should be established. For this, powerful control should be secured.
Besides, duties of seeking for anti-terrorism safety measures at domestic and international significant events, establishing strategic anti-terrorism plan by integrating resources from all terrorism-related organs, and setting up efficient information sharing system such as integration, analysis, and distribution of information about terrorist threats, prevention, and response should be imposed on the director of each anti-terrorism center, who is totally responsible for terrorism-related practices. Moreover, authority to control compilation and execution of the terrorism budget and conduct post evaluation system should be granted to the directors as a measure for powerful control.
Third, prevention of terrorist crimes should be strengthened.
For anti-terrorism, terrorism-related information should be collected most rapidly. Also, all terrorism-related information should be concentrated into the anti-terrorism center. If somebody becomes aware of terrorism suspects, he/she should rapidly follow them, and for rapid tracing, he/she should be allowed to refer to the ID card management system, the driver's license management system, the passport management system, the foreign residents management system, etc., monitoring, interception(all means for communication including mobile phone and Internet), inspection of mails, and computer search for network should be done against terrorism suspects, and authority to demand provision of details of all calls(the phone number and location of the caller) that have been subscribed by terrorism suspects and Internet address-related information from an electric communication provider should be granted.
With this, the director of each anti-terrorism center should be responsible for developing and implementing a system to hinder terrorists from entering the country and chasing after them on all kinds of certificates including a passport and a driver's license as well as a tracing system(for example, physical characteristics) to deter terrorism suspects from entering the country on passports and I.D. cards, and also developing technology to search articles or equipment being used in terrorism in order to give chase to and seek out terrorism suspects in cooperation with organs of each grade.
Fourth, penal provisions against terrorist criminals should be strengthened.
It should be clearly recognized that terrorist crimes are totally different from general crimes in their nature, the current acts of terrorism are intellectual and cruel, and target on many and unspecified citizens and private facilities, and terrorist damage is broad and unexpected and unforeseeable. Therefore it is difficult to prevent an act of terrorism by punishment with the same penalty as for general criminals. For anti-terrorism, powerful punishment should be involved, and according to the nature of a crime, the additional punishment of specific crimes should be applied.
Finally, a system for monitoring of violation of people's privacy and human rights should be sought for.
The reason why enactment of the「Anti-terrorism Act」is delayed is anxiety about subsequent violation of citizens' privacy and human rights, and consolidation of anti-terrorism organs' authority. While the「Anti-terrorism Act」is enacted, enactment of an unsafe act by the said reasons is not desirable, which is not capable of efficiently coping with terrorism. Therefore an act to efficiently cope with terrorist crimes should be enacted, and at the same time legal and institutional arrangements should be taken to prevent relevant problems.