Participants at Tuesday's open debate of the UN Security Council on the threat of terrorist acts to the international peace and security unanimously called for the United Nations to play an even more important role in the global fight against terrorism.

The 15-member body began the debate two weeks after at least 171 people were killed in an appalling terrorist attack on two luxury hotels and other landmarks in Mumbai, the Indian financial capital.

Opening the meeting, Croatian President Stjepan Mesic, whose country holds the council's presidency for this month, said that only a global response would provide a solution to the global threat of terrorism.

The level of solidarity between nations would be greater now than it was before the events of 2001, Mesic said, referring to the series of terrorist attacks against the United States.

If there were any doubts for the necessity of that, the most recent attacks in Mumbai had dispelled such doubts, he stressed.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said: "Terrorism is a leading threat to the international peace and security. Combating (it) must be one of the international community's main priorities."

"The United Nations has great responsibility to lead the international community to confront this menace," Ban said. "The United Nations is uniquely well-placed to play this role."

The US ambassador to the United Nations, Zalmay Khalilzad, said that the United States strongly supported the central role of the United Nations in the global fight against terrorism.

To strengthen that role, the organization must improve coordination among programs, with all organs making their appropriate contributions, whether in security, capacity-building, education, economic development or in relieving conditions that terrorists and extremists exploited, Khalilzad said.

All member states must also work together closely to create a less permissive operating environment for terrorists, and comply with their obligations to deny safe havens, funding and other necessities to extremist groups, said the US envoy.

Russia's UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin said the attacks in Mumbai had been evidence of the continuing threat of terrorism and a reminder of the collective responsibility of the international community in combating that threat.

The United Nations was the organization that must provide solid leadership in combating terrorism in an ever-globalizing world, Churkin said.

Strengthening the role of the United Nations in building counter-terrorism strategies was essential, Churkin said. "There is no other option."

China's UN Ambassador Zhang Yesui said that the Security Council, as the core of the international collective security machinery, should play an important role in international fight against terrorism, he said.

"Terrorism is the common threat facing the international community and it is imperative to continue to step up the multilateral counter terrorism cooperation within the UN framework, " Zhang said.

E. Ahamed, minister of state for external affairs of India, said that the heinous attack in Mumbai in his country marked a qualitatively new and dangerous escalation of the terrorism that India had faced for over two decades, during which acts had been sponsored and organized by forces outside its borders.

With the killing of 179 persons, including 26 foreigners, it was the first terrorist attack in India where foreigners were specifically segregated and targeted, he said.

Ahamed called for the council and the international community to proscribe Pakistani group Jamaat-ud-Dawa and other such organizations.

Further, practical measures must be taken at the global and national level to see that the menace of terrorism was uprooted, he stressed.

India had acted with restraint in the face of terrorist attacks, but it must do its duty to protect its people, Ahamed said.

The Charter of the United Nations and other international law provided the framework for such self-defense, he added.

(Xinhua News Agency December 10, 2008)