WASHINGTON, Feb 21 – Americans still consider preventing terrorism as their country’s top foreign policy priority, according to a Gallup poll. The survey came more than a decade after the Sept 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington D.C. that killed nearly 3,000 people, Xinhua news agency reported.
About 88 percent of Americans ranked preventing international terror attacks as No. 1 in a list of nine foreign policy issues, followed by 83 percent who considered prevention of the spread of nuclear weapons as second most important priority. Americans ranked securing energy sources third on the list, followed by helping other countries develop, promoting favourable trade policies for the US, and supporting democracy and human rights abroad.
The survey showed that Americans are most likely to say international issues having a direct impact on the US should be important foreign policy goals, rather than issues that do not directly impact them. Americans give a lower priority to matters that involve the US assisting other countries, and those preferences have been stable over the past 12 years, Gallup said.
“That is not to say Americans are highly isolationist, as two-thirds or more believe a variety of actions designed to help out other countries are at least somewhat important for the US to do,” it said.
“But on a relative basis, Americans show much more consensus on prioritising foreign policy matters that have a more obvious effect on the US,” Gallup added.
BERNAMA
