COLOMBO, SRI LANKA – Sometimes terrorist attacks are the work of those least suspected.
I’d imagine it is true that when it comes to violence men are worse at this than women. This is certainly what it feels like: I don’t have any statistics off the top of my head to demonstrate this definitively.
Not that women are incapable of violence or of being mean. There are lots of anecdotal reports on this, no?
The male propensity for violence extends to terrorism as well. When you look at the news on a regular basis you see that most acts of this nature are executed by men. Not all, but most.
Again, there are exceptions and today’s featured attack is a good example.
On this day in 2008
A suspected Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) suicide bomber blew herself up in a packed railway station in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo, killing 11 people and wounding 92.
When I came out of the ticket counter office, I saw a police officer running with blood on his chest. I saw seven people, including a woman, were lying on the platform.
Ticket counter officer
Local television showed footage of bodies lying in pools of blood. One young man’s body was torn apart by the blast. Four compartments of a train at the island’s main railway station were badly damaged. Shattered glass and shrapnel were scattered around.
The LTTE was particularly adept at recruiting, training and deploying female suicide bombers. I cannot recall any other terrorist group with an equivalent track record: nor can I explain it.
What this attack serves to remind us of is that when it comes to terrorism we should not rely too much on stereotypes. Female terrorists can be every bit as dangerous as their male counterparts.
