New York: India, Pakistan and Afghanistan were among the nations most impacted by terrorism in 2011, according to a new global study, which said the terror strikes worldwide had increased fourfold since the start of the Iraq war in 2003.
The inaugural Global Terrorism Index (GTI) said Pakistan, India and Afghanistan accounted for 12 per cent, 11 per cent and 10 per cent of global terrorist incidents respectively from 2002 to 2009.
In 2011, Middle East, India, Pakistan and Russia were the areas most impacted by terrorism.
Overall, there were 7,473 fatalities in 2011 due to terrorism, which is 25 per cent less than in 2007.
The report said the number of terrorist incidents increased virtually every year since the 9/11 attacks in the US, with most terror strikes occurring in a wider conflict situation.
The index shows that global terrorism only started to increase after the escalation of the Iraq war.
This was subsequently followed by further increasing waves of terrorism in Afghanistan and then in Pakistan 18 months later.
While terrorism fatalities fell by 25 per cent since 2007, coinciding with the wind-down of the Iraq war, Iraq still remained the country that suffered most from terrorism in 2011.
The US, Algeria and Colombia had the biggest improvements over the last ten years.
"Terrorism is one of the most emotive subjects of our time. The impact of terrorism does seem to have plateaued over the last three years but is still unacceptably high," said Steve Killelea, Executive Chairman of Institute for Economics & Peace, which produced the index.
In the decade since 9/11, fatalities from terrorist attacks have increased by 195 per cent, incidents by 460 per cent and injuries by 224 per cent.
PTI
