Terror attacks, deaths up sharply in 2014: U.S.

Extremists in Iraq, Afghanistan and Nigeria unleashed a savage rise in violence in 2014, according to new statistics released by the State Department. Attacks largely at the hands of the Islamic State and Boko Haram raised the number of terror acts by more than a third, nearly doubled the number of deaths and nearly tripled the number of kidnappings. The figures contained in the department’s annual global terrorism report say that nearly 33,000 people were killed in almost 13,500 terrorist attacks around the world in 2014. That’s up from just over 18,000 deaths in nearly 10,000 attacks in 2013, it said.

We must do more to address the cycle of violent extremism and transform the very environment from which these terrorist movements emerge.

Top U.S. counterterrorism envoy Tina Kaidanow

Friday’s reports noted the “unprecedented seizure” of territory in Iraq and Syria by the Islamic State in 2014 along with its continued demonstrated ability to recruit foreign fighters to join its cause and the emergence of self-proclaimed affiliates, notably in Libya, Egypt and Nigeria. It also pointed out a rise in the number of so-called “lone wolf” attacks in the West and the use of more extreme methods of violence by terrorists to repress and frighten communities under their control.

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