The UN Development Programme (UNDP) and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), with funding from the European Union (EU), have launched a new regional initiative titled “Supporting Asian Countries’ Resilience to Violent Extremism in the Digital Space.” Spanning three years from August 2025 to July 2028, the project aims to strengthen the ability of Asian countries to prevent violent extremism, particularly online, with a focus on engaging youth. At the launch event, Andreas Roettger, Head of the Foreign Policy Instruments Regional Team for Asia-Pacific at the EU Delegation to Thailand, emphasized the importance of collaboration and knowledge-sharing, noting that effective prevention is practical, community-driven, and evidence-based.
Violent extremism represents a major security and development challenge across Asia, fueled by ideological motivations, limited socio-economic opportunities, misinformation, and hate speech. Gerd Trogemann, Manager at the UNDP Bangkok Regional Hub, highlighted that the 2016 UN Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism recognized the need for a comprehensive development-focused approach, calling for integrated, systemic, and collaborative responses to this global threat.
Digital platforms have increasingly been exploited to incite division, reinforce biases, and escalate grievances, particularly among youth vulnerable to radicalization. Addressing this multi-dimensional threat requires coordinated actions both online and offline, encompassing prevention strategies, community engagement, and resilience-building.
The initiative emphasizes the importance of engaging youth and civil society, countering extremist narratives, strengthening governance and education, addressing mental health concerns, and supporting the development of national action plans that integrate human rights and gender equality. Delphine Schantz, UNODC Regional Representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, reinforced that preventing violent extremism is not solely a security matter but fundamentally involves promoting inclusion and resilience among communities.
At the launch event, experts, stakeholders, and beneficiaries participated both in-person and virtually, highlighting the critical need for collective efforts to prevent violent extremism and foster safer, more resilient societies across the region.
