A House Divided: The Ninth Review of the Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy and the Future of UN Counter-Terrorism

Regular General Assembly resolutions updating the 2006 United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy (GCTS, henceforth also the Strategy) have set the global counter-terrorism agenda for 20 years. Whatever their political disagreements, Member States (MS) had always adopted the periodic review resolutions, every two or three years, by consensus. On 1 July 2026, that tradition ended as the ninth review resolution was forced to a vote. Even then, only a technical rollover of the 2023 eighth review text proved possible, despite detailed proposals from many MS to update the text. Positively, the overwhelming majority of MS remained committed to human rights, at least rhetorically, and only three deeply isolated MS cast negative votes.

The process nonetheless exposed competing and unresolved visions of the future direction of United Nations counter-terrorism efforts, and it was not possible to strengthen protections concerning human rights, gender, civil society, and oversight and accountability. Confidence in the review process was deeply tested, with precedents that may negatively influence negotiations in 2029. These developments unfolded against a difficult backdrop of geopolitical competition, the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, spreading nationalism and populism, attacks on international law and multilateral institutions, deep polarisation in the General Assembly, and the unpredictable UN80 Initiative to reform the UN. 

Competing visions of global counter-terrorism

Running between March and June 2026, the negotiations quickly revealed that MS no longer agreed on the review’s purpose. By the eighth review in 2023, the resolution had haphazardly grown to 28 pages, with 123 operative paragraphs and a whopping 8 pages of preamble, full of repetition, tangential references to past events and marginal documents, and turgid bureaucratic language. By comparison, the GCTS itself was only a tidy and focused seven pages. The extent to which the sprawling, unfocused review resolutions can strategically guide MS and UN counter-terrorism practices has become increasingly unclear, particularly given the absence of any mechanism reviewing implementation.  

For some delegations, the priority was to expand the GCTS’s repressive operational focus by addressing emerging technologies and artificial intelligence, terrorist financing, border security, organised crime, “behavioural insights”, and evolving threats. Others sought stronger recognition of what they identified as identity-based violence, hate speech, discrimination, extremism and separatism, and sovereignty concerns. Many, meanwhile, emphasised the strengthening of human rights and ensuring a balanced implementation across all four pillars of the GCTS[AA1] [Re2] [BS3]  (I: Measures to address the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism; II: Measures to prevent and combat terrorism; III: Measures to build States’ capacity to prevent and combat terrorism and to strengthen the role of the UN; and IV: Measures to ensure respect for human rights for all and the rule of law).

Particularly active stakeholders included the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Russia, the European Union, the United States, Mexico, Canada and Australia, whereas African States – from the continent most affected by terrorism – and Asian States were comparatively less engaged. Positively, civil society stakeholders were able to engage with the co-facilitators (the two States, Morocco and Finland, who coordinated the negotiations) and many MS.

A process under strain

As these debates unfolded, it became apparent that the ninth review process was not being optimally handled, as others have explained. The co-facilitators were appointed relatively late, at the end of January 2026. The first revised draft was circulated alongside an extensive compilation of Member State proposals under an exceptionally compressed timetable, leaving delegations little opportunity to consult capitals or to caucus with like-minded partners before negotiations began. A broad cross-section of MS expressed concerns about both the drafting methodology and the sequencing of negotiations. Some considered the text overly detailed and operationally expansive, while others questioned whether the drafting process had adequately reflected MS input or preserved the carefully negotiated balance across the Strategy pillars.

For some delegations, the way in which certain proposals appeared to be reflected in successive drafts, while others received more limited treatment, also raised broader questions about transparency and perceived neutrality. Whether justified or not, such perceptions complicated the co-facilitators’ already difficult task of maintaining confidence across a polarised membership. The co-facilitators faced a difficult trade-off: producing a comprehensive draft attracted criticism that the text had become overly detailed, while streamlining it risked reopening carefully negotiated compromises and upsetting the balance among the four pillars.

Two negotiations instead of one

Perhaps the most significant procedural development occurred on 8 June, when the United States circulated a long-rumoured alternative draft to the co-facilitators’ second revised text. It offered a different model: a substantially shorter document that consolidated much of the existing language while significantly reducing the number of paragraphs. The US said the existing text was “bloated, outdated and lacks focus”.  Streamlining the text was not, in itself, unreasonable, given the ungainly size and shape of 2023 review resolution and the even longer text evolving in 2026. 

However, the US proposal removed important references relating to privacy, surveillance, the adverse consequences of counter-terrorism measures, gender, human rights and the mandate of the Special Rapporteur, while preserving, and in some respects expanding operational provisions on terrorist financing, artificial intelligence, biometrics, watch-listing, passenger data and border management. It therefore sought to strengthen repressive measures while weakening human rights and accountability. 

While States obviously have the right to circulate proposals, the US proposal was presented alongside the co-facilitators’ text as a possible basis for negotiations. It thus made the US look like a “shadow co-facilitator” and elevated a national text into a parallel negotiating track before the co-facilitated process was exhausted. The US text sank like a lead balloon. Future co-facilitators may nonetheless need to consider how to preserve confidence in negotiations while accommodating increasingly assertive national agenda-setting.

The outcome: preserving the past, postponing the future

Given the level of disagreement and unwillingness to compromise on red lines, the co-facilitators fell back on the safe option of a technical rollover of the 2023 resolution, thereby side-stepping the impasse or worse, a breakdown of the process. After months of heavy and challenging negotiations, the ninth review thus produced no substantive change. For the first time since the Strategy’s adoption in 2006, the review concluded not by consensus but through a recorded vote, with 141 Member States voting in favour and only three opposed (Argentina, Israel, and the United States).

Despite the tensions, the fall-back position demonstrated the resilience of the existing normative framework, consolidated over two decades of engagement and compromise. References to human rights, civil society, gender, children, the balanced implementation of the pillars, and oversight and accountability were thus retained, along with mention of the Special Rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism. Controversial proposals to introduce ill-defined concepts of non-violent extremism and separatism were avoided, as was the expansion of repressive powers without commensurate human rights safeguards. 

Maintaining these commitments was a significant achievement in a polarised environment. The review demonstrated that broad support remains for the Strategy as the central multilateral framework governing international counter-terrorism cooperation. Yet, it was also true that provisions regarded as settled suddenly became negotiable, threatening to unravel 20 years of consensus and to backslide on human rights. The breaking of consensus was also troubling. There is a risk of these dynamics jeopardising future reviews, particularly if procedural lessons are not learnt to help build back consensus, particularly on human rights.

Beyond the ninth review

The debate following the adoption of the resolution underscored overwhelming support for the Strategy as the only universal framework capable of sustaining multilateral cooperation against terrorism even in the face of geopolitical polarisation. Yet, it also revealed that MS remained deeply divided over its future direction, following the fault lines exposed during the negotiations. The ninth review deferred rather than resolved these competing visions. 

Indeed, human rights advocates and civil society have also identified many areas in which the Strategy review could be improved. The Special Rapporteur drew attention, for instance, to strengthening human rights in areas such as new technologies, terrorist financing and humanitarian exemptions, migration and border security, restrictive administrative measures, incitement, P/CVE, children’s rights, gender, military operations, and remedies for victims; enhancing transparency, oversight and accountability; increasing civil society engagement and protection against reprisals; and rebalancing the activities and funding of UN entities across the pillars.

Some MS are understandably keen to focus less on endless normative innovation and addition to the Strategy and more on effective implementation of existing commitments and institutional coordination. The results-based framework to measure the work of the UN Office of Counter-Terrorism is still in its infancy, and prone to quantitative rather than qualitative assessment of its impact and value-for-money. States’ own counter-terrorism performance is also often not subject to sufficiently comprehensive, independent national and international oversight and accountability. 

In future, the negotiating process is likely to change. The accumulated length and breadth of the text have made it harder to negotiate it as a single document. In the light of the US precedent, proposals to restructure and streamline it should now be expected. Future reviews are also likely to involve more fundamental debates about the strategic purpose and real-world effectiveness of review resolutions, not only the technical drafting of specific provisions. 

Preparation for the tenth review in 2029 needs to start earlier, in order to rebuild normative consensus around how to update and strengthen counter-terrorism measures, in light of new developments, while equally safeguarding and strengthening commitments to human rights, gender and civil society – all of which enhance, not detract from, effective counter-terrorism. Carefully drafted language grounded in international law remains the most reliable path to durable compromise. Procedurally, this will demand coalition-building, sustained engagement with regional groups and capitals, and developing legally robust compromise proposals well before the first draft is formally circulated. It also requires being ready to address parallel negotiating tracks and competing draft texts. 

Some outlier MS may remain unwilling to rejoin the mainstream. While consensus is valuable, it must never come at the expense of human rights. The international community deserves credit for holding its ground against powerful attempts to backslide during the ninth review. The challenge in 2029 will be to move beyond this defensive position and reclaim a progressive agenda to further strengthen human rights – in a world where counter-terrorism measures are a constant source of serious human rights violations in too many countries. 

The research for this piece was led by Annabelle Bonnefont, Legal Adviser to the Special Rapporteur in New York.

This article represents the views of the author(s) solely. ICCT is an independent foundation, and takes no institutional positions on matters of policy unless clearly stated otherwise.

 Photo credit: Mathias Reding on Unsplash