Gijs de Vries

You can't get closer to the heart of national sovereignty than national security and intelligence services.

In intelligence work, there are limits to the amount of information one can share. Confidentiality is essential.

In the fight against terrorism, national agencies keep full control over their police forces, security and intelligence agencies and judicial authorities.

Our strategy should be to strengthen the hand of moderate Muslims.

Terrorists have failed to trigger mass conflict between Muslims and non-Muslims in Europe. We should draw strength from that fact.

Terrorists have failed in what is arguably al Qaida's most important objective - to trigger revolutions.

Muslim organisations tend to have a low level of organisation. The communities in Europe are quite diverse.

In situations of military conflict, civil strife, lawlessness, bad governance, and human rights violations, terrorists find it easier to hide, train and prepare their attacks.

We have an integrated picture of the threat from outside and from within that is provided not only to our foreign ministers but also to our justice and interior ministers.

The majority of the world's Muslims do not believe that terrorism is a legitimate strategy or that Islam is incompatible with democracy.

Ultimately, freedom and democracy are stronger than fear and tyranny.

I remain optimistic. What we've seen in Europe and the rest of the world is that freedom has a much stronger attraction than radical fundamentalism.