Civilian deaths due to improvised explosive devices have increased by 70 percent over the past three years, with more than 53,000 people killed or injured globally between 2011 and 2013.

The Guardian reports:

Civilian casualties from suicide bombings went up by more than a third and attacks by car bombs increased by more than 200%. Civilians accounted for more than 80% of those killed or injured.

The figures were released on Thursday by Action on Armed Violence (AOAV), a London-based research and advocacy group funded by governments, the UN, and human rights organisations.

Iain Overton, its director of policy and investigations, said: “This huge increase in the number of innocent victims harmed and killed by IEDs is a terrible concern – not only to those whose lives are transformed in an instant by these pernicious weapons, but to governments who have to bear the costs of the medical and security implications of these attacks. The use of suicide and car bombing as a major weapon is spreading, and fast. Countries that had not seen their use five years ago are experiencing their horrors now.”

Read more here.

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.

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