Dear friends,

Casablanca, Riyadh, Bali and New York – all these words have been charged with new meaning. They are places where evil has left its scar, where loved ones were lost and heroes are remembered.

Today, there are too many regions where new generations grow up learning to fear and to hate.

Terrorism and fanaticism have come to haunt our times.

In the global campaign against terrorism and fanaticism, it is the strength of our values as much as our joint forces that will prevail. Our strongest weapons are the very values we seek to defend.

People rightly expect their political leaders to provide security. We all expect that counter-terrorism measures will be effective and will intrude as little as possible on our freedoms. This is our duty.

There is a global coalition working strenuously day and night, trying to track down terrorists before they can carry out their dreadful intentions.

It is clear that we all seek the most appropriate and effective measures - and the best possible results.

In order to ultimately prevail in this fight against terrorism, we need to know more about the environment that nurtures hate and fanaticism.

In order to diminish the underlying conditions that terrorists and “the godfathers of terror” seek to exploit, we must identify them.

Factors of human development and human opportunity as well as cultural, religious and educational issues, are all part of this broader picture.

I hope that you – the foremost experts on international terrorism in the world today – can help us provide answers to the following four questions:

- Why do some people justify random killings and suicide bombings?

- Why do some people invoke the name of God while doing devilish deeds?

- What is it in an individual’s development that motivates such acts?

- How do we dismantle the “greenhouses of hate?”

But in our search for the so-called “roots of terrorism,” we must be cautious. We must weigh our words. We must avoid artificial generalisations and misleading abstractions.

What we need is a global coalition of reason and determination backed up by our combined resources. A clarion call that will bring more hope and pave the way for freedom and opportunity.

We must continue to strengthen the dialogue between cultures, religions, nationalities and ethnic groups. While at the same time continue to condemn and fight terrorism. Only by standing together will we prevail.

I have been discussing these and related problems for several years with my close friend the Nobel Peace Laureate Elie Wiesel.

By focusing on the root causes of terrorism, we hope to come closer to answering the big WHY that we asked ourselves, when the bombs exploded in Casablanca, Riyadh, Bali and New York.

I hope we will create a renewed and reinvigorated political outlook. With a comprehensive framework based on new knowledge, we can more easily create a common platform and help men and women around the world to build lives of purpose and dignity – and in safety.

The findings of this meeting will be presented to the participants at another conference that I have called for in New York this Fall on “Fighting Terrorism for Humanity.”

This one-day conference will take place two years after 9/11 - on 22 September – and on the day before the opening of the General Debate in the UN. It will be opened by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Kofi Annan.

It will be a high-level political conference of heads of state and government, but also scholars and religious leaders representing major regions and cultures, who together will stake out paths towards a safer future for us all.

The aims of the conference in New York are basically the following:

- to help identify the most important conditions and factors that triggers fanaticm, hate and ultimately terrorism

- to recommend corrective action

- to present country statements on best practices

The statements and contributions at the New York conference will be presented to the United Nations.

Dear friends,

There can be no excuse for terrorism. No goal can justify it. But we must understand what it is in order to fight it.

I am very pleased that so many of the world’s most admired and respected experts and academics were able to come to Norway to discuss some of the most important questions of our time.

Your contributions in this field are already significant, and hopefully this meeting will foster greater knowledge of phenomena such as terrorism and fanaticism.

And last but nor least, a word of gratitude to the organiser - the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI) - and in particular Mr. Tore Bjørgo.

Good luck in your deliberations!