ISLAMABAD: Suicide attacks became a major tool of militants fighting against the Pakistani state in 2018 as an overall decline in suicide attacks compared with 2017 as the year witnessed a total of 18 attacks.
A study by an Islamabad-based independent think tank, Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies (PICSS), shows that suicide attacks caused 46 per cent of overall deaths in 2018 while 48 per cent of the total number of people injured in militant attacks was caused by the suicide attacks.
Another striking aspect revealed in PICSS Annual Security Journal is that the ratio of death in per suicide attack that increased from 13 to 15 in 2018 as compared with 2017.
According to the report, 267 people were killed in these attacks including, 205 civilians, 20 militants, and 42 security forces personnel, while 460 including 384 civilians and 76 security forces were injured.
Most casualties occurred in a suicide attack in Balochistan killed 181 people, including 174 civilians, 6 security forces personnel, one militant, and injured 256 civilians.
The province of Balochistan was hit by eleven suicide attacks last year, in which 212 people were killed, including 24 security forces personnel,12 militants, and 176 civilians, while 332 were injured which includes 49 security forces personnel and 283 civilians.
In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP), four suicide attacks caused 38 deaths, in which 12 security forces personnel, four militants, and 22 civilians died while 91 were injured in which there were 70 civilians and 21 security forces personnel.
FATA had no suicide attacks in 2018 while Punjab had only one suicide attack in which 14 people including six security forces personnel and seven civilians died, while two civilians were injured.
Sindh also had one suicide attack in which three militants died.