WASHINGTON: The number of Muslims around the world who say suicide attacks are acceptable has fallen sharply in the past six years, as has Muslims confidence in Osama bin Laden, a survey by a US think-tank showed Thursday. But, the Pew Research Center warned in its Global Attitudes Project, significant minorities of Muslims in eight countries surveyed continue to endorse suicide bombings and support the Al-Qaeda leader. In Lebanon, the number of Muslims who said suicide attacks can be justified often or sometimes in defense of Islam fell by 42 percent between 2002 to this year, the study showed. But although down sharply from 74 percent six years ago, one in three Muslims in Lebanon still backed suicide attacks. In Pakistan, support for suicide bombings has fallen by 28 percent to a scant five percent in the past six years. In Jordan, support has dropped 18 points since 2002, but a quarter of Jordanian Muslims still support suicide attacks. Even though numbers have fallen by 15 percent in six years, around 10 percent in Indonesia, the world s most populous Muslim nation, continue to support suicide attacks. Nigeria, Africa s most populous nation, where around half the population is Muslim, also saw a 15 percent drop in support, but that left nearly one-third still in support of the deadly tactic. Turkey and Tanzania saw drops in support for suicide bombings of 10 and six points respectively since 2002. Support in Turkey, which has been rocked by several deadly attacks in recent years, was the lowest of any of the countries surveyed, with only three percent telling Pew pollsters in March and April that they back suicide bombings. In Egypt, support for suicide bombings rose by five percent between 2007 and 2008; Egyptians were not surveyed in 2002. Large numbers of Muslims in the eight countries also said they had lost confidence in bin Laden to do the right thing in world affairs, although support for the Al-Qaeda leader remained high in some countries. That was the case in Nigeria in particular, where nearly six in 10 Muslims expressed confidence in bin Laden, around the same percentage as five years ago. Support for bin Laden fell from nearly six in 10 Muslims in Indonesia and nearly half in Pakistan in 2003, to a still sizeable but significantly lower number of around one-third today. In contrast, only two percent of Lebanese Muslims expressed a lot or some confidence in bin Laden, down from 20 percent in 2003, and in Turkey, the percentage was three percent this year compared with 15 percent five years ago. The most dramatic drop in support for bin Laden was seen among Jordanian Muslims: whereas six in 10 of them expressed confidence in bin Laden just three years ago, only 19 percent did this year. The Pew Global Attitudes Project is a series of worldwide public opinion surveys covering a broad array of subjects ranging from people's assessments of their own lives to their views about the current state of the world. More than 24,000 people in 24 countries were surveyed this year for the project, including just under 8,000 in the eight countries asked for their views on suicide bombings and bin Laden.
