Nigeria has been ranked sixth among the ten countries most impacted by terrorism in the latest Global Terrorism Index report.
Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Burkina Faso, and Syria are the countries ahead of Nigeria in the report published on Friday by the Institute for Economics & Peace (IEP), an independent and non-profit think tank.
The country was said to have dropped two places from last year’s ranking.
The report partly read,” Despite a one per cent decrease in the number of deaths from terrorism overall, the ten countries most impacted by terrorism remained largely unchanged. Afghanistan and Iraq maintained their positions as the two countries most impacted by terrorism, for the third consecutive year.
“There was some movement within the rankings with Burkina Faso overtaking Syria and Nigeria to be the fourth most impacted country, Pakistan moved from eighth most impacted to tenth and Nigeria dropped two places to sixth most impacted country. This is Somalia’s sixth consecutive appearance amongst the five most impacted countries.
“The newest entries to the ten most impacted countries were Niger and Myanmar, which were in eighth and ninth place, respectively. This is Myanmar’s first appearance in the ten most impacted countries, with the current political unrest being responsible for this increase in terror activity.
“Nigeria, Syria, and Somalia were the only countries amongst the ten most impacted by terrorism to record an improvement in score from 2020 to 2021. The other seven countries deteriorated, with the largest deterioration occurring in Myanmar, followed by Niger.”
It added that the total number of deaths from terrorism in Nigeria fell to 448 in 2021, the lowest level since 2011.
The report also said law enforcement, including police and prison officers overtook both military and civilians as the most targeted group of 2021.
It read, “Attacks against police and prisons increased substantially from one recorded attack in 2020 to 75 in 2021, accounting for over a third of all attacks in Nigeria in 2021.
“This was largely driven by an increase in clashes between law enforcement and separatist groups, such as the Indigenous People of Biafra. Civilian deaths dropped 62 per cent from 2020. Military deaths mirrored this trend, with 2021 recording almost half the number of terrorism deaths from the prior year.”
The report, however, listed the killing of over 30 soldiers by gunmen at an army base in Mainok, Kaga area of Borno state as the worst attack in 2021.
