World leaders whose countries are members of the powerful UN Security Council will meet during this month's UN summit to try to put pressure on all governments to stop people who incite others to commit terrorist acts.
Britain's UN Ambassador Emyr Jones Parry circulated a draft resolution to council mem-bers on Thursday afternoon on inciting terrorism, which will be the focus of an open meeting of the 15-member council during the Sept. 14-16 summit.
"It says governments should take every effort to stop people inciting anyone to commit terrorist acts," Jones Parry told several reporters. "It's to discourage all those people who incite others to commit terrorist acts ... in every way possible."
The council meeting will likely be held on Sept. 14 when US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair will be at UN headquarters along with about 170 other world leader for the summit opening, said the Philippines' UN Ambassador Lauro Baja Jr, this month's council president.
The resolution comes on the heels of Britain's announcement last month that it plans to make it an offense to incite or glorify terrorism and will deport or bar radical Islamic preachers and close mosques linked with extremist clerics.
The announcement followed the July 7 terror attacks on London's transit system that killed 56 people and bombings on July 21 that targeted three subways and a double-decker bus.
Jones Parry said the proposal was not a result of the London attacks but a response to the view among many countries that there is a gap in the dozen international treaties and numerous UN resolutions aimed at fighting terrorism -- "and the gap in that market is those people who go around inciting terrorism."
"It's a tricky, sensitive issue because we all respect free speech, but there must be a limit on the freedom to incite terrorist acts and that's what we're pointing out," he said.
Referring to past attacks, Jones Parry said, "My argument to terror has been consistent: If you were in Istanbul, if you were in Dar es Salaam, if you were in Bali, you suffered terrorism."
"We have all in one way or another suffered from it. It's not a US exclusive or a British exclusive. It's a common interest of mankind," he said.
The draft calls on all states to "prohibit by law the incitement of a terrorist act or acts" and take measures that may be "necessary and appropriate to prevent such conduct." It calls on countries to deny safe haven "to any persons ... whom there are serious reasons for considering that they have been guilty of such conduct."
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