KIDNAPPING &

TERRORISM

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1.0 INTRODUCTION..........................................................

....4

2.0 KIDNAPPING..............................................................

.....4

2.1 Meaning of Kidnapping......................................................................4

2.2 Possible Potential Victims……………………………………………………...4

2.3 Reasons for Kidnapping against abduction........................................5

2.4 Effects of Kidnapping…………………………………………………..……….5

3.0 TERORRISM...............................................................

.....6

3.1 Source, Meaning and Depreciatory application of

term.....................6

3.2 Types of Terrorism …………………………………………………………….7

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3.3 History of terrorism incidences.........................................................9

3.4 Causes of terrorism.........................................................................12

3.4.1 Issues Arising from Terrorism that Law will address………………....12

4.0 LAWS CREATED IN RESPONSE TO ADDRESS THESE

ISSUES……………………………………………………………….13

5.0 CONCLUSION.............................................................

....15

6.0 RECOMMENDATIONS……….……………………………………16

7.0 REFERENCES..............................................................

...17

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1.0 INTRODUCTION.

Criminology is the scientific study of the making of laws, the breaking of

laws, and society’s reaction to the breaking of laws. Sometimes these

laws are arrived at by the consensus of most members of a community;

sometimes they are imposed by those in power. Communities have

grown in size, from village to world, and the threats to communities

have grown accordingly. World level threats necessitated that

criminological research and crime prevention strategies become

globalized.

2.0 KIDNAPPING

a. Meaning of Kidnapping

Kidnapping is the taking away or transportation of a person against

his/her will, usually holding the person in false imprisonment.

Generally kidnapping occurs when a person without lawful authority,

physically moves another person without the latter’s consent, with

intent to use the abduction in connection with some vile objective.

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b. Possible Potential Victims.

a. Children

b. Wealthy Families

c. Influential Members of the society

d. Loved ones

e. Women

c. Reasons for Kidnapping

a. Financial Gain: by asking for ransom, or the transatlantic slave trade

which was a form of kidnapping as men were taken from there

villages against their will.

b. Human Trafficking: this is primarily termed as the Mordern day

slavery. Some of this individuals are forced from there home

residence and end up in different countries around the world. They

end up being used for cheap labour and sexual exploitation.

c. To commit a crime: Some abductors kidnap especially young girls in

order to sexually assault them. Some of this individuals some from

mental illnesses.

d. To gain Custody: this mostly relates to child custody disputes where

a parent without custody rights, will take away the child and go with

them for good.

e. Revenge: this will either be used to inflict bodily injury to the victim

or a third party.

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d. Effects of Kidnapping

a. To the Victim: Physical and Psychological Trauma to the victim e.g

an anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to

psychological trauma. It includes sleep problems, nightmares,

impaired memory, panic attacks and depression.

b. To the Society: Economic paralysis dues to payment of a ransom for

example and this will affect the finances of those affected.

c. The victim may feel overprotected by family members and friends.

d. Kidnapping may lead to murder or sexual exploitation.

e. The kidnapper will face sanctions from the state.

3.0TERRORISM.

a. Source, Meaning and Depreciatory application of term.

There is no universally accepted definition of terrorism. There is also no

universally accepted definition of terrorists. Even the United Nations a

world peace body has not come up or adopted a single definition of

terrorism and therefore it is necessary for us to consider some of the

definitions that have been adopted in international and national legal

instruments. The international instruments comprise international

instruments in form of agreements e.g. the Montreal Convention For the

Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against Civil Aviation 1972. [Montreal

Convention] in this convention terrorism was defined as an act of

aviation sabotage.

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Another international convention also attempted to address terrorism

i.e. the Hague Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of

Aircrafts: (The Hague Convention) the Act said “Any person who on

board an aircraft in-flight… Unlawfully, by force or threat of force or by

any other form of intimidation seizes or exercises control of that aircraft

or attempts to perform such act or;

They were trying to define terrorism and one of the things that they

noted was “unlawfully, or by use of force, seizing or exercising control of

an aircraft in flight.”

The UK Terrorism Act of 2000 has a very long definition…threat

constitutes terrorism, serious violence against a person, creates safety

to the public etc. Uganda Anti-terrorism Act of 2000…threats or use of

force or violence against a group of people stand out in the definition.

The US Patriot Act attempts to define terrorism. The Kenyan Bill defines

terrorism in very similar language.

From the definitions in the legal instruments, we can agree that an act

of terrorism refers to the threat or use of violence in order to create

extreme fear and anxiety in a target group so as to coerce them to meet

the political, religious or ideological objectives of the perpetrators.

b. Types of Terrorism.

There is no exact classification of terrorism. However a good list can be

inferred to the early 1975, where the Law Enforcement Assistant

Administration in the United States formed the National Advisory

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Committee on Criminal Justice Standards and Goals. The Task Force

classified terrorism into six categories:

a. Civil Disorder- a form of collective violence interfering with the

peace, security and normal functioning of the community.

b. Political Terrorism- violent criminal behaviour designed primarily to

generate fear in the community, or substantial segment of it, for

political purposes.

c. Non-Political Terrorism – terrorism that is not aimed at political

purposes but which exhibits conscious design too create and

maintain a high degree of fear for coercive purposes , but the end is

individual or collective gain rather than the achievement of a

political objective.

d. Quasi-terrorism – the activities incidental to the commission of

crimes of violence that are similar in form and method to genuine

terrorism, but which nevertheless lacks its essential ingredient. It is

not the main purpose of the quasi-terrorists to induce terror in the

immediate victim as in the case of genuine terrorism, but the quasi

terrorist uses the modalities and techniques of the genuine terrorist

and produces similar consequences and reaction.

e. Limited Political Terrorism – genuine political terrorism is

characterized by a revolutionary approach, limited political

terrorism refers to acts of terrorism which are committed for

ideological or political motives but which are not part of a concerted

campaign to capture control of the state.

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f. Official or State Terrorism - this refers to nations whose rule is

based upon fear and oppression that reach similar to terrorism or

such proportions. It can also be referred to as structural terrorism

which is defined broadly as terrorist acts carried out by government

in pursuit of political objectives.

Several sources have further defined the typology of terrorism to include:

I. Political terrorism

II. Substate Terrorism.

i. Social Revolutionary Terrorism

ii. Nationalist-separatist terrorism

iii. Religious extremist terrorism

Religious fundamentalist terrorism.

New religious terrorism.

iv. Right-Wing terrorism

v. Left-wing terrorism

vi. Single issue terrorism

vii. State Sponsored terrorism.

viii. Regime Terrorism

III. Criminal Terrorism.

IV. Pathological terrorism.

c. History of Terrorist Incidences.

Terrorism is an old problem and one needs to know the motivation of the

terrorist act in order to be able to take an appropriate state response.

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In the period up to the early 70’s an attempt was made to equate

terrorism which manifested itself with aircraft hijacking and sea piracy

which preceded aircraft hijacking. The nature of aircraft hijacking was

examined and it was discovered it was quite different from sea piracy.

The earliest reported terrorism activities was in 1930 where an aircraft

was seized and diverted to another country by Peruvian revolutionaries

and after this incident there was no other seizure until 1947 and then

from1947 such hijacking of aircrafts seizures increased .

In 1959 a US Flag aircraft was seized in the US and forced it to fly to

Cuba.

In 1952 in Yugoslavia, 3 Yugoslavian crew members on an in-country

flight subdued the other flight personnel and diverted the aircraft to

Switzerland. When they landed in Switzerland, the reason was that the

political climate in Yugoslavia was intolerable and the crew members

were seeking asylum in Switzerland. When they reached Switzerland an

extradition request was made by Yugoslavia and Switzerland denied the

request and gave asylum to the crew noting that they were political

refugees.

In 1970 9 revolutionary Japanese students calling themselves the red

army hijacked a Japanese Boeing 727 and forced the aircraft to fly to

North Korea (there was a flight embargo on flights from Japan to North

Korea and the students wanted to make a point by flying to North Korea)

they later flew back to Japan.

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In 1961 5 men and 1 woman who were a group of political activists, they

were Portuguese who were supporting a particular Captain Galvao who

was a presidential aspirant. They seized a Portuguese Aircraft and

commandeered the pilot to circle over Lisbon to be able to drop leaflets

supporting Captain Galvao and once all the leaflets were finished, they

commandeered the aircraft to Morocco. They sought Asylum in

Morocco while the govt was investigating but were later expelled from

Morocco but Brazil proceeded to grant them asylum.

In 1967 an aircraft carrying a Congolese Prime Minister was captured

and the Prime Minister jailed.

The fight to liberation of Palestine was responsible for many aircraft air-

jacking. Between 1963 and 1970 there were a total of 210 incidences of

aircraft hijackings. For many of the aircrafts hijackings the US was

involved.

The 90 Minutes at Entebbe incident of 1976. From the late 1970’s

terrorist activities took a different dimension. In 1980 terrorism took a

new dramatic turn and there was a lot of threats of violence involved

and it became clearer that certain groups were targeted which raises so

many legal issues.

The financing of terrorism has become a major problem, organisations

and religious group exist that finance terrorism activities and a

proliferation of terrorist organizations of all kinds.

Local support for foreign terrorist activities is another phenomenon.

Religious fundamentalism is also another reason of increased terrorist

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activities. Muslims have been mentioned but they also apportion blame

to the Christians. It is both ways.

d. Causes of Terrorism.

A terrorist must indeed have a reason. In many cases the motive is

political, there are situations where some people flee countries for

political havens, political turmoil, there are also cases where terrorist

attacks are carried for transportation purposes.

Unbalanced persons have also played their role (disturbed persons)

a. Ideological factors – ideological antagonism is one of those factors that

force people to carry out terrorist activities. There are those who

believe in capitalism and other in communism. Ideologies can either

be political or religious.

b. Criminal reasons – there are cases where criminal escaping from one

country to another hijack aircrafts.

c. Terrorism activities for purposes of personal material gain.

3.d.1Issues Arising from Terrorism that Law will address .

1. Injury to persons;

2. Property damage;

3. Issue of custody of hijackers – how are terrorists to be handled once

they surrender or are arrested:

4. Prosecution of terrorists – who has the jurisdiction to prosecute?

Capacity to prosecute?

5. Safety of passenger where an aircraft is hijacked – how does law

ensure the safety of passengers?

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6. Extradition – returning a terrorist to their country of origin upon

request.

7. Economic and Social impact of terrorist activities

8. Root causes of terrorism;

9. in most cases it may involve more than one country and law has to

address this;

10. Asylum – the Charter of the United Nations and more clearly the

Universal Declaration of Human Rights grants the right to every person

to seek asylum in a foreign country.

11. State sponsored terrorism; some states support terrorism and

terror activities

4.0LAWS CREATED IN RESPONSE TO ADDRESS THESE

ISSUES.

The International Legal Regime – International Agreements that

comprise treaties and conventions on terrorism, regional agreements

and bilateral agreements.

Geneva Convention of 1958 intended to deal with sea piracy but

included aircraft hijackings but which was found to be hopelessly

inadequate as the activities involved in aircraft hijacking were totally

different from Sea Piracy. The Montreal Convention: many matters

concerning terrorism were left out.

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The Tokyo Convention: this convention had many weaknesses and did

not confine its subject matter to aircraft hijacking but instead dealt with

a number of crimes some of which were local in character.

Some of the problems with the conventions was that they conflicted with

other laid down conventions like the Declaration of Human Rights which

says that everyone has the right to seek and enjoy in other countries

asylum from prosecution.

This principle was reaffirmed by the UN Resolution in Article 14 of 1967 –

it reaffirmed the right to seek asylum by declaring that the situation of

the person invoking the right to asylum is of concern to the international

community and that person shall not be subject to extradition and ought

to be granted asylum

Article 7 obligates parties to prosecute or extradite persons who commit

terrorism activities and yet we have the universal declaration of human

rights which says that they must be given asylum and not prosecuted.

These were just some of the weaknesses and there was also lack of

political will.

At the international level there is a legal regime supposed to address

terrorism but it is faulty.

Can a national legislative be adequate? UN Resolution of 2001 soon

after the September 11th Attack. This is the resolution in which the UN

expressly recognised the act of terrorism and called upon countries

members of the UN to create national laws in response to terrorism.

Countries are expect to implement soft laws concerning terrorism.

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Countries like Kenya should consider the following issues concerning

terrorism in the new dispensation

1. Porous Borders; e.g. borders between Kenya and Somalia, Ethiopia,

Eritrea etc;

2. Definition of Terrorism is problematic and there ought to be a clear

definition of terrorism in the national legislation;

3. Jurisdiction to try offenders – who has the right to try offenders?

4. Capacity to try terrorists? Or the knowledge of terrorism and

capacity to hold them in custody;

5. Constitutional compliance – to what extent is a country going to

abridge constitutional rights of its citizens to comply with terrorism

laws?

6. Information sharing: countries must be able to share information;

7. Terrorist Organisations

8. Disaster preparedness – contemporary problems to be addressed

9. Root causes of terrorism – consider the root causes

10. Domestic acts of protests must be considered

11. Issue of Sovereignty – to what extent can a country give up its

sovereignty for sake of investigations and arrest of terrorists.

12. Impacts on the population; social and economic impacts

13. Public participation in law making and in implementation of the

laws;

14. Matters concerning the rule of law; to what extent we going to

15. What is law addressing and how are we trying to deter terrorism

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Section 4, 93, 12, 16 AND Section 30. Terrorism has presented very

many legal challenges and in many cases anti-terrorism legislation.

Certain : Concept of a right – who has the right; Concept of punishment –

how do you use punishment to deter the terrorist act if the perpetrator is

willing to die; Social contract theory – this is challenged ; State

sovereignty has been challenged; Idea of fighting proxy wars; Issue of

collateral damage

5.0 CONCLUSION.

In 1974 Yasser Arafat in an address to the UN General Assembly

succinctly explained that … the difference between the revolutionary

and the terrorist lies in the reason for which they fight. Terrorist are

criminal gangs who seek publicity.

The one who stands by a just cause and fights for the freedom and

liberation of his land from the invader, and they cannot be possibly be

called terrorists.

6.0 RECOMMENDATIONS.

a. Ratify conventions.

b. Laws on money laundering

c. Disaster preparedness and emergency action plan

d. Share information

e. Create legal framework for corroboration

7.0 REFERENCES.

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I. BOOKS

a. Criminology Handout by Dr. John Martin Owor (2011).

b. Good Muslim Bad Muslim by Mahmood Mamdani

c. Pakistan and the Mumbai Attacks (2010) by Sebastian Rotella

d. Imperial Hubris by Michael Scheu (2010) 1st Edition

e. Terror in the name of God by Jessica Stern 2nd Edition

f. The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror1st Edition by

Bernard Lewis

g. Jihad: The Origin of Holy War in Islam by Reuven Firestone

h. Inside Terrorism by Bruce Hoffman

II. WEBSITES.

www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigative/terrorism

www.kenyalaw.org/cases

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