Security Council adopt UN resolution to choke off funding for Islamic State
The 15 finance ministers of UN Security Council nations have moved to starve funding for the so-called Islamic State (Isis) and other terrorist groups.
At tonight’s meeting, the first of finance ministers since the Security Council was formed in 1945, a resolution was adopted urging countries to “move vigorously and decisively to cut the flow of funds” to Isis.
The terrorist group is believed to be the world’s richest, with monthly revenue estimated to hit £53m, and the resolution aims to prevent the group from smuggling oil and antiquities.
But experts Morning Wire spoke to earlier today warned that the resolution was unlikely to lead to any significant changes – at least in the short-term.
Tom Keatinge, director at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) Centre for Financial Crime and Security Studies, said the resolution – which builds on a 1999 resolution targeting the jihadist group Al-Qaeda – was “effectively last night’s dinner reheated”:
Fundamentally, nothing will change until at the operational level there is a proper assessment of how one disrupts terrorist financing.