Safety, Prevention and Coexistence

The European Forum for Urban Security (EFUS) is an international non-governmental organisation formed by local entities. It was created in Barcelona in 1987 under the auspices of the Council of Europe.

The aim of the network is to strengthen crime prevention policies, promote peaceful coexistence and the participation of local governments in national and European urban security policies. In fact, this has inspired the creation of other national forums in Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain.

It does this by establishing links between European local authorities through the exchange of good practices and knowledge, cooperation and training, acting as a link between local authorities and national, European and international institutions.

The organisation in run through an Executive Committee, formed by 33 territorial administrations elected by all the members of the network (around 250 cities and local administrations).

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The Spanish Forum for Urban Prevention and Security, of which Barcelona City Council is a member, is an association of municipalities and local entities for the defence and promotion of public prevention and security policies by means of forums for discussion and the exchange of good practices as a network in order to tackle the urban security challenges facing cities.

In order to do this, it promotes the dissemination of experiences, projects and public policies among member cities by means of meetings, conferences, seminars, work sessions and publications, as well as acting as a consultant in the design of projects linked to public prevention and security policies.

FEPSU is the Spanish representative at the European Forum for Urban Security (EFUS), an association of around 250 cities and regions in 17 countries.

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The Counter Terrorism Preparedness Network (CTPN) is an international collaborative network focused on analysing what cities that have suffered a terrorist attack have done to improve their ability to prepare for, and respond to, such situations.

The CTPN was formally created in 2018, after a coordination summit in London, which focused on the experience of the Paris attacks in 2015. This led to a series of recommendations, such as the need to continue with shared learning among European agencies, as well as other international agencies, by means of creating associations with other cities.

The aim is to influence strategic agreements among member cities, so that they can prepare to face terrorism and respond and recover more rapidly in the event of suffering a terrorist attack.

The work network is made up of cities in which experts and academics exchange knowledge and information to combat terrorist actions.

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The Radicalisation Awareness Network (RAN) is a network of professionals created in 2011 that works to prevent the radicalisation of susceptible groups or to help people who have already started to become radicalised.

The network, which is funded by the European Commission's Internal Security Fund, is run by a consortium of external members who provide logistic, technical and administrative support.

Its members are professionals involved in employment and social education, teaching, health, representatives from local authorities, police forces and prison officers. They are dedicated to preventing violent extremism in all its forms, as well as reintegrating people who have experienced a radicalisation situation.

This is achieved through themed working groups and the production of publications for its network of professionals.

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The objective of the project, which will end in April 2025, is to develop an operational and dynamic platform that identifies vulnerabilities, suggests specific threat scenarios and provides recommendations to mitigate them in places of worship and religious gatherings.

Different scenarios will be introduced to analyze possible different attacks. They will be simulations to virtually explore in 4D the different attack scenarios and evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed mitigation measures. The result will be a system of technological and organizational modules that covers the current security and protection needs of places of worship and mass religious gatherings.

In addition, thanks to this project, stable and enriching collaborative relationships will be established between religious leaders, public order forces or local civil communities, among others.

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The Secur’Cities project was launched in January 2019 with the first collaboration between the cities of Barcelona and Lyon, who joined forces to improve the protection of public spaces that host events and activities with large crowds in the event of critical incidents. The aim of this collaboration is to generate common strategies and working methodologies based on the exchange of good practices in this area. The three-year project has a budget of €2.78 million, 90% of which has been financed by the European Commission through the Internal Security Fund - Police (ISFP).

In the wake of the terrorist attacks that took place on 17 August 2017, the city of Barcelona identified the need to improve its prevention and response capacity for incidents involving multiple victims. In this context, it was imperative to propose a new urban landscape design that would reduce the vulnerability of public spaces, provide shelters in case of attacks by active shooters, prevent mass trampling by vehicles and mitigate the blast wave of an explosion.