The East Asia Summit, a grouping of 18 countries including India, on Monday vowed to scale up efforts to deal with terrorism, radicalisation and transnational crimes including by ramping up coordination with anti-terror watchdog FATF and relevant UN agencies.
At the end of its 14th summit here, the powerful bloc came out with a declaration listing measures to be taken by member countries to deal with various security challenges facing the region as well as on ways to counter narratives of the terror groups.
The East Asia Summit is the premier forum in the Asia-Pacific region to deal with issues relating security and defence. Since its inception in 2005, it has played a significant role in the strategic, geopolitical and economic evolution of East Asia.
Apart from the 10 ASEAN member states, East Asia Summit includes India, China, Japan, Republic of Korea, Australia, New Zealand, United States and Russia. India was represented at the summit by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"Coming together for a better future for our planet. Today's East Asia Summit was characterised by fruitful deliberations on ways to mitigate various global challenges, he tweeted.
The EAS declaration called for effective measures to counter terrorism including by containing terror financing in the region, seen as an affirmation of India's call for concerted approach to deal with terror groups.
The declaration said the EAS will deepen cooperation with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the FATF-style regional bodies.
The EAS also resolved to ensure effective implementation of FATF standards to deal with terror financing
The bloc also recognised the importance of preventing criminal misuse of information and communications technologies (ICTs) such as the internet for terrorism or to incite terrorist acts while resolving to intensify cooperation to combat and prevent transnational crimes.
The EAS also asked member countries to enhance collaboration in containing transnational crime consistent with domestic laws and regulations within and between member countries.
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