THE MAJOR world powers yesterday adopted a 25 point plan to counter terrorism, at a one day summit given added urgency by recent attacks against US targets.
The Group of Seven (G7) countries and Russia approved a package which aims to tighten border controls to curb terrorists freedom of movement, restrict their funding and improve intelligence swaps by police.
The French Foreign Minister, Mr Herve de Charette, who chaired the meeting, said the plan would mark "a milestone in the determination of the international community to fight terrorism".
The US Attorney General, Ms Janet Reno, described terrorism as a loud message from a small voice to try to drive proud nations to alter their course in tribute to an invisible tyranny".
"Today we have stood together resolute in our determination not to let this happen," she said.
The plan was announced after several hours of meetings between foreign and interior ministers from the eight nations amid a heavy police presence in the shadow of the Arc de Triomphe.
Initially scheduled at a June G7 summit clouded by the deaths of 19 US troops in a truck bomb in Saudi Arabia, yesterday's summit gained further impetus after the Atlanta bomb and the explosion of TWA Flight 800.
The measures included a warning about the use of the Internet and a pledge to prevent terrorists from obtaining travel documents.
US officials had brought along fresh proposals including a boost in airport security and improvements in marking and tracing explosives.
Details are to be finalised by experts at a working group at the end of the year.
The US would also share information from a new FBI forensic science database that would serve as a clearing house for evidence - against terrorist suspects, Ms Reno said.
The working group is also to prepare an international convention on explosives, which Ms Reno dubbed a Terrorist Bombing Treaty outlawing perpetrators of such attacks.
The British Home Secretary, Mr Michael Howard, said it was impossible to give 100 per cent protection against terrorism. "But I believe the measures we have agreed will make it more difficult for terrorists, and will improve the protection we can offer to our citizens," he said.
"Terrorism is now an international virus," said the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Malcom Rifkind.
Ministers and officials insisted there had been no talk - and thus no quarrel about Washington's call for sanctions against nations accused of sponsoring terrorism, Iran, Iraq, Libya and Sudan.