Our world has become smaller; a slang often used nowadays, as traveling has become easy, fast, convenient and even safe. But we often underestimate the safety of the country we travel to.
Before I begin, I still have to state that these are statistics and results from researches. I have traveled several countries, and some are placed as high risk zones. Sierra Leone for example, a country I flew to 10 years ago was one of those. Just after the 10-year war, where one million people lost their lives, somehow in a power vacuum, and a strong UN presence. Entire villages were burnt down, and the capital city of Freetown was accommodating at least double of its capacity; people of any age with their hand or arm cut off during the war, and inhumane act practiced by the rebels against people whom they thought belonged to the government, or at least were in support of it. But it didn't stop with the group of adults; even children became victims of this barbaric act. But when walking down the town streets, even at night, I felt no danger confronting me.
Safe cities like Hamburg in Germany can on the other side show a different face.
Three of the four suicide pilots of the 11 September 2001 attack, or the 9/11 attack had previously formed a terrorist cell in Hamburg, where they regularly shared their plans in the Al-Quds mosque. In the July 2006 bombing of Lebanese Islamists, two passenger trains in western Germany failed to be struck. 2007, the “Sauerland group”, a four-member terror cell of the Islamic Jihad Union was composed of German converts and German Turks. The group had planned to use car bombs against U.S. military installations and civilian targets on German soil. In March 2011, an Islamist Kosovo Albanians shot and killed two U.S. soldiers and injured two others seriously, who were on their way to Afghanistan (assassination at Frankfurt airport on March 2, 2011).
According to the findings of the Constitutional protection of almost all Islamists, terrorist activities in Germany are attributable to the fundamentalist Salafism.
Coming back to the topic, sometimes we cannot choose where to travel to, as some jobs require visiting certain countries. A huge insurance broker called Aon, insuring many employees worldwide has made a research and statement about the risks of terror attacks and political violence in the world.
The result of that research is a map of Terror, which was developed together with the Risk consulting company “The Risk Advisory Group”. The map rates the risk of each country, and was just published this Wednesday.
I may consider this research also as the aftermath of the Arab Spring, as from the 200 countries that were investigated, 90 were found carrying a high risk for travelers to become victims of a terror attack. Funny enough, the group working on this project found out, that the risk in the USA was not so high as many may think, as the US seemingly has many enemies in the world, and their obvious safety measures, even towards regular tourists flying to the country, make the US look as if it needs high protection. Europe is seen to also have a low risk of Terror attacks, but there is a slope towards the south of the continent, starting with France, then Spain and finally Greece with the highest risk, maybe also through the Euro crisis, which has sparked unrest in the country. Germany is still enjoying to be considered as safe, as one reason is the stability, even in the present Euro crisis, and there have also been no major threats of Terror attacks.
One can observe the highest risk in the Middle East and Central to East Africa. This makes sense, as poverty, politics and religion are three of the main issues provoking unrest and Terror.
By Thomas Fleckner
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