Terrorism numbers

I don't know much about the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) other than it has offices in Australia, England the U.S.; it has been producing the Global Peace Index for eight years. This year they have also produced the Global Terrorism Index. There is no universally accepted definition of terrorism; IEP uses the definition agreed upon by the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland: "the threatened or actual use of illegal force and violence by a non-state actor to attain a political, economic, religious, or social goal through fear, coercion, or intimidation."

As we all know, terrorism is on the upswing. 2013 saw a 61 percent increase in deaths from terrorism globally. Since 2000, there has been a five-fold increase in the number of deaths caused by terrorism. Last year the index recorded 17,958 deaths from terrorism in 60 countries, the leaders being: 

• Iraq — where 2,492 incidents in 2013 left 6,362 dead. 
• Afghanistan — where 1,148 incidents left 3,111 dead. 
• Pakistan — where 1,933 incidents left 2,345 dead. 
• Nigeria — where 303 incidents left 1,826 dead. 
• Syria — where 217 incidents left 1,078 dead.

The U.S. had nine attacks and six deaths. The United Kingdom had a high number of attacks (131), but most of these were small-scale attacks in Northern Ireland and left only three dead. The IEP finds that only four terrorist organizations — the Islamic State, Boko Haram, the Taliban and al-Qaeda — had asserted responsibility for more than 66 percent of the deaths.