Combating terrorism: how five foreign countries are organized to combat terrorism: report to congressional requesters

Original publisher: Washington, D.C. : The Office, [2000]. LC Number: HV6431 .U5 2000 OCLC Number: (OCoLC)44698324 Subject: Terrorism -- Government policy. Excerpt: ... B-284585 usually did not have access to many of their internal documents, classified plans, or policy evaluations. Second, we were in each country for a relatively short time, ranging from 1 to 2 weeks. As a result of these limitations, we sought to describe how each country organized its programs to combat terrorism, not to evaluate the operations or the effectiveness of those programs. For our review of terrorism-related laws, we relied on officials to identify appropriate statutes and did not do our own comprehensive research or analysis of the countries ' laws. Because of the limitations we faced in reviewing foreign countries ' policies and programs, we asked the foreign officials to comment on the accuracy of our work. After we conducted our overseas visits, we wrote summaries documenting our observations and conclusions and sent them to the officials for their verification, review, and comment. All of the officials provided written comments, and we made changes to our summaries as appropriate. We then used these summaries as the basis for drafting this report. Our overall methodology consisted of reviewing applicable documents and interviewing a broad array of national-level government officials whose organizations had a significant role in combating terrorism. Where possible, we met with regional and local government officials in the countries we visited. We also met with contacts outside the government to provide us with different perspectives on the countries ' efforts to combat terrorism. For example, we met with experts from academia, research organizations, the media, and other nongovernmental organizations. For our specific objectives, we interviewed officials at the level of government most able to provide us information on our topics. To describe how the five governments were or...