The number of deaths from terrorist attacks nearly doubled in 2014 over the previous year as attacks increased by 35 percent, the State Department said Friday in its annual report, documenting what experts say is the worst year on record for a problem that continues to increase.
The report cited two related trends for the dramatic spike in attacks, which follows another dramatic increase in 2013: The ongoing civil war in Syria and the rise of the Islamic State extremist group, which is active there and also in Iraq.
Data in the report indicates how actions by the Islamic State and other Islamist extremist groups are driving the increase. Though terrorist attacks occurred in 95 countries in 2014, 60 percent of them were in just five countries where those groups are most active — Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India and Nigeria — and 78 percent of the fatalities were in Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Nigeria and Syria.
The lethality of terror attacks also spiked. There were 20 attacks in 2014 that each killed more than 100 people, compared to two the previous year.
The report also noted a rise in “lone wolf” attacks by individuals with no apparent links to known terrorist groups.
“These attacks may presage a new era in which centralized leadership of a terrorist organization matters less, group identity is more fluid, and violent extremist narratives focus on a wider range of alleged grievances and enemies,” said Tina Kaidanow, the State Department’s coordinator for counterterrorism.
“It’s of concern. It’s something that we’re watching.”
In response, the United States has made progress in getting international partners to work against the rise in terrorism, Kaidanow said, though she was unable to give specific examples of how those efforts have blunted the rise in attacks.
“I think we have been effective in building the capability of our partners globally,” Kaidanow said, noting improvements in interdicting foreign fighters, which is a major problem in Syria, and cutting off terrorists’ finances.
“I don’t want to portray for you that there isn’t plenty left to be done. There certainly is,” she added.
