RCMP looking at ways to identify young people at risk of becoming radicalized

Good overview by Douglas Quan on the various approaches being taken to reduce the numbers of those drawn to extremism:

For those who show signs of becoming involved in violent extremism but who have not yet crossed that threshold, the RCMP is developing an intervention program — set to roll out by the end of the year — designed to link those individuals with community mentors for “advice, support and counselling.”

Dash confirmed that public safety officials have been studying different intervention models, such as the Berlin-based EXIT program, which provides help to Germans trying to leave the neo-Nazi movement. A few years ago, the group created an offshoot program to support families of radicalized Muslims.

Dash declined to say what criteria the RCMP have developed to decide who merits intervention. She did say that someone who expresses extremist views is not necessarily going to be radicalized to violence. “It could be just someone who is being curious. We don’t want to stigmatize anybody.  There’s no one-size-fits-all indicator,” Dash said.

Experts say various “diagnostic tools” have been developed around the world to assess where someone falls on the “spectrum of dangerousness,” but no consensus has been reached on which one is best.

In the U.K., a police-led early-intervention program called Channel saw in its early days referrals of young people simply for wearing what were deemed to be “radical” clothes, according to a 2012 report by the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence. “People were not sure what to look for and so they erred on the side of caution,” a Channel coordinator was quoted as saying.

The program has since developed a “vulnerability assessment” framework consisting of 22 behaviours to look out for. They include spending time in the company of extremists, changing style or appearance to accord with the group, loss of interest in friends, and condoning violence or harm towards others.

RCMP looking at ways to identify young people at risk of becoming radicalized | canada.com.

And Wesley Wark, as usual, pointed in his criticism for the lack of serious discussion by the Government:

The 2014 Public Report on the Terrorist Threat to Canada sums all this up. Whether you agree with the government statement or not (and maybe there are other things we should be worrying about, such as cyber threats, climate change impacts, pandemics, a new Cold War, etc…) the report moves our thinking into the present and nudges us out of a frame of reference dominated by legacy fears of Al Qaeda.

So why the whisper? Maybe the government can’t find the headline in its own report. Maybe it feels uneasy because it can’t say with certainty what the exact threat to Canada from terrorism is in the post-Al Qaeda age. Maybe it feels the public doesn’t really need an education on the new terrorism threats or is not interested. Maybe it thinks there are no votes here. Whatever the answer, it’s simply not right. We need a little less megaphone on the world stage and a little more at home.

Wesley Wark: Where’s the megaphone on the threat to Canada?