Majority Of Boko Haram's 'Suicide Bombers' Are Women And Children, Study Finds

The majority of suicide bombers that terrorist group Boko Haram uses to kill innocent civilians are women and children, a study has revealed.

Analyzing 434 suicide bombings carried by the Nigeria-based group since 2011, researchers at the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point and Yale University found that at least 244 of the gender identifiable 338 attacks were carried out by women.

In just 2017 alone, Boko Haram has already sent 80 women to their deaths.

Following the abduction of 276 female students aged 16 through 18 from their school dorms April 2014 - which sparked the global 'Bring Back Our Girls' campaign - the ISIS-affiliated insurgent group's use of women bombers increased.

'Almost immediately after the Chibok kidnappings ... Boko Haram's use of women suicide bombers skyrocketed,' said Jason Warner, assistant professor at the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, to CNN.

Warner added that the report suggests 'that Boko Haram started using women suicide bombers after it realized the potency that gender and youth offer in raising its global profile after the Chibok kidnappings.'

The report also states that Boko Haram is 'at the forefront of normalizing the use of children as suicide bombers.'

'Boko Haram has shattered demographic stereotypes as to what a suicide bomber looks like,' says Warner.

'It is the first terrorist group in history to use more women suicide bombers than men, and is at the vanguard of using children as suicide bombers.'

The study further details how of the 134 suicide bombers with determinable ages, 60 per cent were teenagers or children, and the youngest was seven.

The researchers also found that women and children are far more easily swayed by Boko Haram than men, and they are far more expendable.

A former insurgent told researchers that women 'are cheap and they are angry for the most part,' and also stated that 'using women allows you to save your men.'

One of the lead authors of the report, Hilary Matfess, told CNN that the choice to use suicide bombers 'upends social norms about women and children, which make them effective beyond merely the lives that they claim when they are detonated.'

But there is mistrust growing caused by the use of women and children in such capacity and that is believed to 'undermine social cohesion and will make the process of post-conflict reconciliation and redevelopment all the more difficult,' she added.

With the area in which Boko Haram is based in northeastern Nigeria being extremely dangerous, fieldwork for the study was limited.

'Media reports often did not report full details of the bombings,' added Warner.