A US terrorism expert has revealed that suicide attacks by women in Iraq are bound to increase in the coming days because of the terrorists' increasing reliance on women bombers.
"Between January and April, there were 12 suicide attacks by women in Iraq. That marks an exponential increase," Farhana Ali, a US international policy analyst of Pakistani origin, told AFP after a symposium on terrorism at the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting in Washington.
Twelve women carried out suicide attacks in Iraq in the first few months of this year compared with 11 between 2003 and 2007, according to Ali.
"So long as this conflict continues, you will see greater instability in Iraq and women will be greatly victimized -- you will see more women in Iraq choose suicide terrorism in the next few months," she predicted, adding that she had warned US officials and policy makers of the threat since 2005.
"It's only in the past two months that we have given serious attention to this issue. Why? Because female attackers in Iraq are hurting our efforts for peace and stability in that country," she said.
Ali, who worked as an adviser to the US government before joining the private sector as an international policy analyst, blamed the rise in female suicide bombers largely on the marginalization of Iraqi women since the US invasion in 2003.
"Iraqi women, slowly, over the course of the conflict have been marginalized," she told AFP.