Per Stig: al-Qaeda vil blæse til ilden

In fact, while researching a paper on EU-US cooperation, I found out that Al Qaeda was not included in the EU’s main list of terror organizations. Here is the complete list.
European officials confirmed to me that stunning fact.
I need to clarify my earlier post here:
THE EU is using two different lists: this one and the one mirrorring the UN Consolidated List.
But recently talking to European officials, they confirmed that there was a heated debate to include AQ on the main list that I linked to. But the refusal front won.
Even though the EU has another list, it still does not make any sense why they did not put Al Qaeda on the main list. Every nation has just one terrorist list except the EU, why make things complicated?   

I wrote an article for Tech Central Station on that very topic. (You can read it here)

Here are some excerpts:

Following the September 11 attacks, the European Union formulated an official list of terrorist organizations. Groups such as the Basque separatist organization ETA, “the external security arms of Hezbollah, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad”, the real IRA, and the Orange Volunteers were placed on this list, which obliges member states to seize their assets. But there was no mention of Al Qaeda and this was three months after the attacks in New York and Washington DC. The most recent EU list of December 2005 includes now 48 groups (they removed Hezbollah altogether) but still no Al Qaeda.

As a comparison, Al Qaeda is of course included in the US State Department list as well as the UK and Australia ones, which seems only natural and common sense. So, how come the European Union does not consider Al Qaeda a terrorist entity?

Even though the EU has a different definition of terrorism than the US, there’s no way Al Qaeda could not fit it. Europeans have been historically lenient towards what they assume to be “freedom fighting” groups or “mostly social” entities such as Hezbollah. But Al Qaeda cannot be considered either a freedom fighting group, except if one assumes that they are liberating the ex Caliphate, or a social group. But still the EU would not have it; Al Qaeda does not seem to fit its definition of a terrorist group.