A Continuing Threat
Just ten days ago, we marked the third anniversary of that September day known forever around the world simply as “9/11.”

At my direction, on September 11, all U.S. ports of entry were closed at 8:46 a.m. to observe a moment of silence.

Like most Americans, 9/11 is etched in my memory.

We still grieve with the families of the 2,933 innocent victims who lost their lives that day.

9/11 changed America forever. And, it changed the world.

And it certainly changed the way we need to view national security.

For two centuries, the United States had been lulled into a false sense of security with respect to terrorism, perhaps under the illusion that we were somehow protected by oceans to our east and west and by peaceful neighbors to our north and south.

9/11 utterly shattered that illusion.

The terrorist attacks were a wake up call to the United States—and to all civilized nations—that we must do everything we reasonably—and responsibly—can to prevent such death and destruction from happening again.

This threat is continuing—and it’s real. There is credible intelligence that al Qaeda and their associates are plotting an attack in the United States to disrupt our presidential elections.

The United States is not the only target of global terrorists.

It is Europe. It is moderate Muslims. It is globalization. It is the global economy, as well.

But more, it targets the forces of globalization that lead to economic uplift, democratization and reform.

Al Qaeda and its associated terrorist organizations, Jemaah Islamiyah, struck again in Djakarta, just two weeks ago.

These global terrorists struck in Madrid on 3-11. And in Bali and Istanbul and elsewhere around the world.

A planned terrorist attack in the UK was thwarted last month.

The consequences of a large-scale terrorist attack in the United States, and its impact on the economies of other countries could be devastating.

We all have a stake in preventing global terrorism.

The U.S. Response to Global Terrorism
After 9/11, one thing was immediately apparent to those of us in the U.S. Government: we had to act—and act quickly to protect our nation, our citizens, and our economy.

The status quo was not an option.

And act we did.

DHS—and the Creation of CBP
And, one of the most important steps the United States took to defend against global terrorism was to establish the Department of Homeland Security.

This is the largest reorganization of our federal government in over 50 years, since the reorganization of 1947 to deal with the Cold War.

The establishment of the Department of Homeland Security a year ago last March involved the transfer and bringing together in one Department of all—or parts—of 22 agencies of our government.

The Department of Homeland Security has two core missions:

First, to prevent further large-scale terrorist attacks in the United States, and

Second, prepare for and respond to large-scale terrorist attacks—a mission that involves organization of first responders, such as local police and fire departments and emergency medical personnel.

One of the most important ideas of the DHS reorganization was the creation of one border agency of our government, one agency within the DHS to manage, control and secure our nation’s borders, all its entry points and between, for all purposes—customs, immigration, agriculture protection, and anti-terrorism.

That agency is the agency I head—United States Customs and Border Protection, or “CBP.”

Customs and Border Protection was created by merging frontline immigration inspectors, and all the agents of the Border Patrol with U.S. Customs.

Customs and Border Protection has 42,000 employees, and as Secretary Tom Ridge knows, it is the largest actual merger of people and functions taking place within the Department of Homeland Security.

With 42,000 employees working under me, CBP constitutes about one fourth of all of the employees of the Department of Homeland Security, which is not surprising when one considers the importance of the security of our borders to the security of the homeland.

The priority mission of CBP is homeland security.

For the unified border agency of our country, that means—the priority mission is preventing terrorists and terrorist weapons from getting into the United States.

And we must perform this mission, to the maximum extent possible, without shutting off the flow of legitimate trade and travel, and without shutting down our economy and that of our trading partners.

I have called these our Twin Goals: security and facilitation.

No other agency of the U.S. Government has a more important mission today than CBP. Because the best way to prevent an attack by terrorist operatives is to prevent them from entering the United States in the first instance, and to prevent them from being able to get terrorist weapons, including weapons of mass destruction, into the United States.

How the U.S. Dealt with Threat to Global Trade
But we have not just reorganized. We have devised and implemented a strategy to secure and facilitate the movement of legitimate trade to the U.S. and to improve security against global terrorism, and yet do so with improved efficiency.

Let me use the security initiatives we are using in the maritime environment to illustrate the overall strategy.

The greatest threat to global security in the maritime environment today is the potential for terrorists to use the international maritime system to smuggle terrorist weapons—or even terrorist operatives—into a targeted country, such as the United States.

Let me talk about the risk.

Every day, about 25,000 seagoing containers arrive—and are off loaded—at our nation’s seaports. That’s nearly 9 million a year.

They come in two sizes, as you know—the 20-footers and the 40-footers.

Think of the disruption to trade and to national economies if even a single one of those containers goes off.

The threat from international maritime cargo requires a security strategy to identify, detect, and deter this threat at the earliest point in the international supply chain, before arrival at the seaports of the targeted country.

When you think about it, the container is the potential Trojan Horse of the 21st Century.

National security experts, such as Stephen Flynn, have pointed out the vulnerability of oceangoing cargo containers to terrorist exploitation.

These warnings arise precisely because it is easy to conceal a weapon inside a container.

It’s easy to make a container into a weapon.

Indeed, the “sum of all fears” is a “nuke-in-a-box.”

One does not wish to be an alarmist, but this much is known:

1. Bin Laden has been trying to get his hands on a nuclear device or fissile materials to make one for at least six years, and
2. He reportedly has met with Pakistani nuclear scientists.

The reality is: we must build a global maritime security system to prevent and withstand terrorist attacks.

Any terrorist attack using a container could stop global trade in its tracks, unless we have a maritime security strategy that can detect, deter and prevent such an attack.

U.S. Strategy to Secure and Facilitate Trade
We have implemented just such a strategy in partnership with other nations and in partnership with the private sector. Because after 9/11, we had to figure out a strategy to secure the primary system of global trade—containerized shipping—without grinding global trade to a halt.

I saw the effects right after 9/11 of increasing inspections and scrutiny at our borders.

We virtually shut down our land border with Canada when the wait times skyrocketed from 20 minutes on September 10—to over 12 hours by September 12, 2001.

So, in late 2001, we developed and implemented a comprehensive strategy to increase security against the terrorist threat, but at the same time actually facilitate the movement of trade.

We did this through four interrelated initiatives:

• The 24-Hour Rule,
• The Container Security Initiative (CSI),
• The Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT), and
• The National Targeting Center, housing our Automated Targeting System.

Under these initiatives:

• We obtain advance electronic information on all cargo shipped to the U.S. 24 hours before the cargo is loaded at foreign seaports. This is the 24-Hour Rule.
• We developed the Automated Targeting System and with it, we evaluate, at our National Targeting Center, each and every one of these containers for terrorist risk before they are loaded and shipped to U.S. seaports.
• By partnering with other countries, our trading partners, we have implemented the Container Security Initiative—CSI—to be able to inspect all high risk containers before they are loaded on board vessels to the U.S., and
• We have partnered with the private sector. We now have over 7,000 companies enrolled in the U.S. Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism. These are the owners of the global supply chain, and our private sector partners have dramatically increased security of their supply chains, from the foreign loading docks to the U.S. ports, in exchange for U.S. Customs and Border Protection giving their goods faster processing through U.S. ports on arrival. That’s the trade-off that has made C-TPAT work—and it works.

Every one of these initiatives is designed to make our borders smarter—and to extend our borders by pushing our security measures out beyond our physical borders, so that our ports and our borders are not the first line of defense.

Every one of these initiatives is designed to meet the “Twin Goals” of vastly increasing security, but doing so without choking off the free flow of legitimate trade.

These are the guiding lights that have informed our strategy.

They make use of technology, advance information, extended border concepts, and partnerships to achieve these goals.

None of these initiatives existed before 9/11.
Let me briefly describe how each element of the U.S. strategy works, and fits together.

24-Hour Rule
Before 9/11, there was no requirement that U.S. Customs receive manifest data in advance of arrival.

Today, under the 24-Hour Rule, it is mandatory that CBP receive detailed manifest information in advance, electronically, 24 hours before containers are loaded.

Compliance with the 24-Hour Rule has been excellent.

Automated Targeting System
We also developed a sophisticated Automated Targeting System that for the first time assesses the risk for terrorism of every oceangoing container headed to a United States seaport, before it arrives on our shores, before it leaves the outbound port.

This was not done before 9/11. It wasn’t possible without the 24-Hour Rule.

We now evaluate and risk-score all 9 million sea containers before they arrive. We are also evaluating, prior to arrival, air cargo and cargo shipments by truck and rail across our land borders.

Our automated targeting system is dynamic.

It consists of hundreds of targeting rules that are derived from strategic intelligence, and it has rules based upon anomaly analysis, things about a shipment that don’t make sense.

Every container above a certain score is deemed high risk and must be inspected, using large-scale x-ray equipment and radiation detection, on arrival or before, which takes me to the Container Security Initiative—CSI.

Container Security Initiative (CSI)
In January 2002, I proposed the Container Security Initiative to target and inspect containers at foreign seaports before they are loaded on vessels bound for the U.S.

It was a simple, yet revolutionary idea, primarily because it contemplated that foreign Customs authorities, working with the U.S., would do outbound screenings—not just inbound—for high-risk containers in order to improve the overall security of the movement of containers from that country’s seaports to the ports of the U.S.

Before 9/11, there was no Container Security Initiative, no program that required inspection of high-risk containers before they left the ports of embarkation or transshipment.

Indeed, it wasn’t possible to do this without the 24-Hour Rule and the Automated Targeting System to risk manage for the terrorist threat. So, I think you can now see how one initiative builds upon the other to achieve security of the movement of trade, and yet facilitates it also.

CSI is the only multinational program in place in the world today that is actually protecting global trade lanes right now—that is protecting the primary system of global trade—containerized shipping—from being exploited or disrupted by international terrorists.

CSI not only adds security to the movement of cargo containers, but because the targeting, and if necessary, inspection occurs at outbound ports, rather than at the ports of arrival, the containers move faster and more efficiently and predictably through the supply chain.

And, there are the Twin Goals: Security and facilitation.

We have CSI agreements with 20 countries, and we have CBP targeting teams deployed and stationed in 25 ports outside the United States.

That means that CSI is now operating at 25 of the largest container mega ports in the world, principally in Europe, Asia, and Africa.

The first country to sign a CSI agreement with the U.S. was the Netherlands in June 2002. We implemented CSI in the Port of Rotterdam in September 2002. But I should note that CSI was developed in partnership with Canada in March 2002.

In addition to Rotterdam, currently, CSI is in place in:

LaHavre, France
Bremerhaven and Hamburg
Antwerp
Gothenburg, Sweden
Genoa, La Spezia and Naples, Italy (CSI becomes operational at the port of Naples later this week.)
Piraeus, Greece
Algeciras, Spain

In Asia, at:
Singapore
Yokohama, Tokyo, Nagoya, and Kobe, Japan
Hong Kong
Busan, Korea
Port Klang and The Port of Tanjung Pelepas or “PTP,” Malaysia
Laem Chabang, Thailand, and
Port of Durban, South Africa

We are working toward implementing CSI in 10 more ports before the end of this year. I believe CSI will be at 35 ports by the end of this year. And we won’t stop there! We’ll continue to expand the CSI security network.

Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism (C-TPAT)
The last initiative I want to discuss is the Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism.

We also realized that we needed to partner with the private sector to secure trade, so in November 2001, I proposed a partnership—Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism—or C-TPAT.

This program pushes cargo security even further back into the supply chain to require increased security at the point of origin, the point of stuffing a container, at the foreign manufacturer’s loading docks.

Several other countries have developed similar supply chain security programs through private sector partnerships. Sweden, for example, has an excellent customs-private sector program called STAIRSEC, and Canada has Partners in Protection (PIP).

The essence of these partnerships is, like C-TPAT, expedited processing in exchange for increasing security.

C-TPAT includes measures to ensure best security practices are followed at the manufacturer’s loading dock and throughout the logistics supply chain.

C-TPAT partners are now starting to use more secure, smarter containers, that tell U.S. Customs and Border Protection whether it has been tampered with during their journey.

This is what I have called “the Smart Box.”

C-TPAT began in November 2001 with just seven partners—companies like Target Stores, General Motors and British Petroleum. Today, more than 7,000 companies participate in the program. They include most major U.S. importers, and cover more than 40 percent of imported goods shipped by cargo containers to the U.S., by value.

As a great, former American President said in another context: “trust, but verify.” And CBP has hired and trained a cadre of supply chain security specialists that travel the world and validate that security commitments of our C-TPAT partners are met.

Call to Internationalize the Strategy
But, while the U.S. has pioneered a strategy for the security of global trade, collectively all of us must do more to secure what moves into—and through—ports of the world, not just into the ports of the United States.

I would like to see the EU join with us on the strategy to prevent, not just the U.S. from being hit, but preventing the EU and its member states from being hit, as well.

That’s why we are actively discussing with the EU the adoption of the 24-Hour Rule; expanding of CSI to goods being shipped to EU ports; the adoption of a Customs-Trade Partnership program; and the use of automated risk targeting to help identify what is a potential terrorist risk.

The 24-Hour Rule, CSI, C-TPAT, and automated risk targeting are the key elements for a global strategy to secure and facilitate global trade, not just trade from certain European or Asian nations and the United States, important as that security network is—a network already largely in place.

The strategy we have implemented in partnership with other nations and the private sector secures only a portion of the global supply chain—principally the trade routes to the United States.

To better protect global trade against the threat of global terrorism, we need to promptly make the 24-Hour Rule, CSI, C-TPAT, and automated, risk-based targeting international standards that all nations adhere to.

Such a strategy would be benefit all nations for two reasons:

First, should a terrorist attack occur in the United States or any other country in the trade chain, the economic impact would be potentially devastating and the economic ripples would be felt around the world. All nations have a stake in protecting global trade and the global economy.

Second, securing supply chains assures predictability and uniformity of approach for each participant in the supply chain.

For companies to compete and for nations to have confidence in the security of goods flowing through their ports, a common approach is imperative.

Multinational companies that manufacture, import and export out of dozens of countries everyday cannot afford to put dozens of different systems in place to satisfy dozens of different national requirements and rules.

This approach will probably not secure trade. It most certainly will not facilitate it.

The U.S. strategy and the four interrelated initiatives recognize that security and facilitation are not mutually exclusive.

The U.S. initiatives do both.

The core elements of the U.S. initiatives can be used to form an international Framework of “standards,” governing customs-to-customs relationships and customs-to-business relationships.

In my judgment, the Framework would consist of these five elements:

First, all nations joining the international Framework or regime would require advanced manifest information about shipments 24 hours before lading.

The data elements to be provided would be harmonized, so all nations joining in the Framework would require and receive the same data on shipments, preferably electronically.

Second, each country should employ a common risk management approach with regard to the terrorist threat, in the way “high risk” containers are identified, inbound and outbound.

Third, there should be information sharing relevant to terrorist risks between the customs authorities of nations participating in the Framework.

Fourth, at the reasonable request of the receiving nation, based upon a common risk targeting methodology, the sending nation's customs agency would perform an outbound inspection, preferably using detection equipment, such as large-scale x-ray machines and radiation detectors, of high risk containers.

Fifth, each nation participating in the Framework would agree to provide benefits, such as expedited processing, to private sector companies that meet minimal supply chain security standards and best practices.

Some of these measures could be implemented now. For example, most EU member states have CSI agreements with the United States.

The EU and its member states could extend the EU zone of security by three simple actions:

• First, adopting a 24-Hour Rule,
• Second, assessing all such shipments for risk, and
• Third, entering into bilateral—even multilateral agreements—for security inspections of high risk shipments heading for European seaports from, say, Port Said, Karachi, or Singapore.

The EU and its member states, and the U.S. have a working group designed to do this, and it is making great progress.

But, beyond the EU and the U.S.: How can we implement a global strategy to secure and facilitate international trade?

How do we implement this global Framework?

I believe that the World Customs Organization can—and should—lead this effort and get it done.

The International Maritime Organization—IMO—implemented international standards for the security of seaports throughout the world, minimum standards that took effect in July of this year.

IMO standards may help secure against unauthorized access to ports—and that’s important—but we must also focus on what moves into—and through—these ports.

That’s where a WCO endorsed Framework for security and facilitation of global trade comes in.

The WCO has the participation of the customs administrations of 163 countries, representing 99 percent of global trade.

And customs administrations have important authorities that exist nowhere else in government—the authority to inspect everything, all cargo, all goods, shipped into or exported from a country.

This is also the authority to refuse entry or exit. And the authority, for example, to expedite, or delay entry.

Customs administrations always require information about goods being imported, and often require information about goods exported. They can, with appropriate legislation, require that information be provided in advance and electronically.

These classic “customs” authorities can be used for more than interdicting illegal drugs, assuring trade compliance, and collecting revenues. They can—and should—be used to secure trade against terrorists and the terrorist threat.

It is an unacceptable and an unnecessary drag on trade to inspect every shipment. So all advanced customs administrations tend to risk manage for a variety of issues, some like the U.S., use automated systems.

That is why customs can—and should—play a central role in the security and facilitation of global trade. As I described in my remarks at the WCO Council last July, this should be the role of Customs in the 21st Century.

But we don’t want—and the international trade community should not be burdened with—163 different sets of requirements to secure trade against the threat of terrorism. There should be one set of rules.

And, the WCO has already begun work that could lead to a Framework.

Last June, the WCO has adopted a resolution that established a High Level Group of heads of customs, Directors General, to draft the global Framework I have talked about.

The private sector, who own and know the supply chain, will be consulted before the Framework is adopted.

But, I am hopeful that a draft of the Framework will be presented to the WCO Policy Commission this December.

Time is of the essence. And we do not know how much time we have.

No country would be required to join the WCO Framework or regime for the security of global trade, but if they do join, they will be agreeing to adhere to the Framework.

Goods from a Non-Framework country will undoubtedly be viewed as a higher risk by receiving nations.

That said, the WCO Framework needs to recognize that not all developing countries currently have the capacity to participate in the type of WCO Framework I have outlined.

For a country that signifies an intent to join the Framework, that truly has high-level political will and support to take all steps that are prerequisites, a consortium of developed countries should be prepared to assist with the requisite capacity building.

At a minimum, though, a developing country must first have taken real steps toward making four commitments:

• One, commit to professionalism and integrity of its customs workforce. It makes no sense to invest in capacity building or training if corruption is endemic.
• Two, commit to use risk management principles and other measures required for securing and facilitating the movement of trade.
• Three, commit to provide tangible benefits in the form of expedited processing that is transparent—to companies that secure their supply chains.
• And four, commit to do reasonable export inspections at the request of the receiving country.

If the commitment is there, a consortium of developed countries that have adopted the WCO Framework would work to assist in obtaining detection equipment needed through the World Bank loans or other sources; training in security and risk management; and assistance with automation of customs processes.

But I call for all nations to join together to ensure that the core elements of CSI, C-TPAT, advance information requirements, and risk targeting approach are internationalized.

It is imperative that these security principles are applied throughout the world as soon as possible so that all ports, in all nations are secure from the physical and economic threat of global terrorism.

Conclusion
All of the initiatives I’ve described are part of a strategy to achieve what I have called the Twin Goals:

Securing the movement of trade, while at the same time facilitating that movement.

The reality is: With the initiatives I’ve described, we can do both.

And that would be the ultimate irony for global terrorists.

Not only will we have secured global trade against terrorists like Bin Laden, but we will have succeeded in making the trading system more secure against pilferage and shipments of contraband.

And, we will have made the system faster, more efficient, and more predictable than it was before 9/11.

With a sense of urgency, I call on the international community to take action.

I call on the Customs authorities of the world to take action.

I call on the private sector to join with us.

If there is a better way to achieve security and facilitation of global trade in this age of global terrorism than the one we have pioneered and implemented, then let us pursue it without delay.

But let us put our shoulders to the wheel and get this done instanter.

Together, we can do this!

*Commissioner Bonner reserves the right to edit his written remarks during his oral presentation and to speak extemporaneously. Thus, his actual remarks, as given, may vary slightly from the written text.