10 deadliest attacks that took place around the world before Sri Lanka blasts

At least 290 people were killed and around 500 others injured in a string of eight powerful blasts, including suicide attacks, that struck three churches and luxury hotels frequented by foreigners in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday, shattering a decade of peace in the island nation after the end of the brutal civil war with the LTTE. Countries from across the globe, including the US, the UK, Russia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh expressed shock and condemnation over the deadly blasts at churches and hotels in Sri Lanka on Easter Sunday.

Sri Lankan authorities have arrested 24 people from the minority Muslim community in connection with the multiple blasts that rocked the island nation. However, the government said they will not disclose the details of the suspects involved in the attacks to prevent them from getting publicity. According to PTI, police officials privately said the suspects were all from the minority Muslim community.

Also Read: Sri Lanka serial blasts: What we know so far about the barbaric attacks

But this not the only barbaric and deadly attack that took place in the world. There are more such attacks that rocked the world where more than 200 people were killed.

Here’s a list of countries and major terrorist incidents:

1. September 11 attacks also referred to as 9/11 terror attack: It was a series of four coordinated terrorist attacks by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda against the United States on the morning of September 11, 2001. The attacks killed 2,996 people, injured over 6,000 others, and caused at least $10 billion in infrastructure and property damage. Additional people died of 9/11-related cancer and respiratory diseases in the months and years following the attacks.
2. Camp Speicher massacre (Iraq): On 12 June 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) killed at least 1,566 Shia Iraqi Air Force cadets in an attack on Camp Speicher in Tikrit. At the time of the attack, there were between 4,000 and 11,000 unarmed cadets in the camp. ISIL fighters singled out Shia and non-Muslim cadets from Sunni ones and murdered them. The Iraqi government blamed the massacre on both ISIL and members from the Arab Socialist Ba’ath Party – Iraq Region.
3. 1990 massacre of Sri Lankan Police officers: The 1990 massacre of Sri Lankan Police officers was a mass murder of Sri Lankan Police officers that took place on 11 June 1990. Members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), a separatist organization, are alleged to have killed over 600 unarmed Sri Lanka Police officers in Eastern Province, Sri Lanka. Some accounts have estimated the number killed as high as 774.
4. Mogadishu bombings: On 14 October 2017, a massive blast caused by a truck bombing in Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, killed at least 587 people and injured 316. The truck was detonated after it was stopped; the actual target of the attack is believed to have been a secure compound housing international agencies and troops. Though no organisation claimed responsibility, officials stated that a key member of the cell that carried it out told them Al-Shabaab was responsible.
5. Yazidi communities bombings (Iraq): The 2007 Yazidi communities bombings occurred on August 14, 2007, when four coordinated suicide bomb attacks detonated in the Yazidi towns of Til Ezer (al-Qahtaniyah) and Siba Sheikh Khidir (al-Jazirah), near Mosul in Iraq. The Iraqi Red Crescent estimated that the bombs killed at least 500 and wounded 1,500 people, making this the Iraq War’s most deadly car bomb attack.
6. Cinema Rex Fire: Cinema Rex Fire took place on 19 August 1978. The Cinema Rex, located in Abadan, Iran, was set ablaze, killing at least 420 civilians. The fire started when four men doused the place with airplane fuel before setting it alight. The ruling Pahlavi regime of Iran initially blamed “Islamic Marxists” for the fire, and later reported that Islamic militants started the fire, while the anti-Pahlavi protesters blamed the intelligence service of the nation, SAVAK for setting the fire.
7. Beslan school siege (Russia): The Beslan school siege (also referred to as the Beslan school hostage crisis or Beslan massacre) took place on 1 September 2004, lasted three days, involved the illegal imprisonment of over 1,100 people as hostages (including 777 children). The crisis began when a group of armed Islamic militants, mostly Ingush and Chechen, occupied School Number One (SNO) in the town of Beslan, North Ossetia (an autonomous republic in the North Caucasus region of the Russian Federation) on 1 September 2004.The hostage-takers were the Riyad-us Saliheen, sent by the Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev, who demanded recognition of the independence of Chechnya, and Russian withdrawal from Chechnya. On the third day of the standoff, Russian security forces stormed the building with the use of tanks, incendiary rockets and other heavy weapons. In which 34 people were killed, including 186 children.
8. Karrada bombing (Iraq): On 3 July 2016, ISIL militants carried out coordinated bomb attacks in Baghdad that killed 340 civilians and injured hundreds more. A few minutes after midnight local time (2 July, 21:00 UTC), a suicide truck-bomb targeted the mainly Shia district of Karrada, busy with late night shoppers for Ramadan. A second roadside bomb was detonated in the suburb of Sha’ab, killing at least five.
9. Air India Flight 182 bombing: Air India Flight 182 was on the Toronto–Montreal–London–Delhi route. All 329 people on board Air India Flight 182 on June 23, 1985, were killed, including 280 citizens or permanent residents of Canada. They were lost to a bomb that exploded while their plane was in Irish airspace, en route from Canada to India. The bomb had been planted in Canada in an act of terror planned by extremists allegedly advocating for a separate Sikh state in the Punjab.
10. 1993 Mumbai bombings: The 1993 Bombay bombings were a series of 12 bomb explosions that took place in Mumbai, India, then known as Bombay, on 12 March 1993. The coordinated attacks were justified by many as revenge for earlier riots that killed many people. These were the first serial bomb blasts of their kind in the world. The single-day attacks resulted in 257 fatalities and 713 injuries.