Education key to fighting radicalization: EC official

The Director of the European Commission (EC)'s Directorate General on Education and Culture, Chiara Gariazzo, insisted Thursday on the role of equal opportunity in fighting extremism while speaking at the opening of a conference on education and the fight against radicalization at the Council of Europe here.

"Giving everyone a good start in life is the key to combatting marginalization, which is the breeding ground of radicalization," declared Gariazzo, to open the Conference on Human Rights and Democracy in Action: Addressing Radicalization and Extremism through Education.

The two-day conference gathered representatives of education ministries, education professionals and civil society organizations in order to examine and further develop tools provided by action plans on the subject that were created through joint initiatives by the Council of Europe (CoE) and the European Commission.

"Democratic values need to be taught and internalized from an early age and this needs to start at school," Gariazzo insisted.

He recalled terrorist attacks in Paris in January and in Copenhagen in February as "a bitter reminder that something was going wrong in our society," but called attention to popular reaction calling for increased fundamental values that showed "EU citizens were calling for more citizenship as the proper answer to violent extremism."

Luxembourg Ambassador to the CoE Michele Eisenbarth also spoke during the opening of the conference, calling attention to the role of modern technology in the radicalization process.

"We need a much clearer understanding on how social media and the internet are used in the spread of extremism," Eisenbarth pleaded.

The conference is part of a range of efforts included in the CoE's action plan "The fight against violent extremism and radicalisation leading to terrorism," published by the international organization's Committee of Ministers in May. Enditem