US State Department recognises Sawab Centre as a pioneering voice against extremism online

The US-UAE partnership to counter terrorists was established in 2015 and has attracted eight million followers on social media from more than 83 countries

The Sawab Centre counters propaganda from ISIS and other extremist groups. Sawab Centre

The US State Department celebrated on Wednesday the fifth anniversary of the Sawab Centre – a partnership with the UAE to counter extremism online.

Created in 2015 amid the rise of ISIS, it was launched by the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Anwar Gargash, and former undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs, Richard Stengel.

In a statement, the State Department praised Sawab’s work since its inception to fight misinformation and expose extremist narratives.

“The centre has worked to counter and correct misinformation via social media, according to its overriding mission to confront extremist groups’ attempts to exploit the social media space to spread their distorted ideas,” it said.

Sawab has attracted about eight million followers from 83 countries to its social media platforms.

It has channels in Arabic, English, and French, and has launched about 50 awareness campaigns.

The number of impressions across its platforms is more than 1.15 billion.

Campaigns the centre has run in support of the global coalition fighting ISIS include #FateOfTerrorists, #DaeshLiesExposed and #AfterTerrorism.