Over 5,000 killed in jihadi violence in November: Study

London, Dec 11: More and more people continue to be sacrificed at the altar of jihadi violence across the world and a study has found that 5,000 people died worldwide in November as a result of such violence.

This was revealed by a BBC study Thursday, which recorded a total of 664 terrorist attacks in 14 countries and found the four worst-affected countries to be Iraq, Nigeria, Afghanistan and Syria, accounting for 80 percent of all terror-related deaths.

The BBC study was coordinated with the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR) -- a non-profit non-governmental think tank based in London and aimed at quantifying the human cost of jihadi violence in one month.

The study recorded a daily average of 22 terror attacks and 168 fatalities. Islamic State (IS) militants operating in Iraq and Syria were found to be responsible for over 2,000 deaths.

According to the investigation, of the 5,042 people killed in all, a majority -- 2,079 -- were civilians. Military personnel made up 1,723 deaths. Nearly 1,000 jihadis were also reportedly killed during the attacks.

Iraq was found to be the deadliest country, accounting for a third of all the deaths and the country also saw the highest number of terrorist attacks.

Nigeria was the second deadliest country with the Boko Haram militant group blamed for the killings there.

Taliban violence made Afghanistan the third deadliest country, the study said.

"The data makes it clear that jihadis and the Al Qaeda are no longer one and the same," Director of ICSR, Peter Neumann, said.

"Sixty percent of jihadi deaths were caused by groups that have no formal association with the Al Qaeda, and they were the ones who would vie for the leadership of the (terror) movement," he said.

"The overall picture is that of an increasingly ambitious, complex, sophisticated and far-reaching movement."

The single deadliest attack in November was a bomb attack on the Grand Mosque in the Nigerian city of Kano that killed 120 people, according to some accounts.

Bombings accounted for the most deaths overall and many people also died as a result of gun attacks, shelling and beheadings, according to the study.

IANS