International terrorist attacks declined sharply last year and the number of anti-US attacks dropped as well, the US State Department reported today.
The US again branded seven countries - Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria and Sudan - as sponsors of terrorism.
Despite the drop-off, Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell said "we cannot relax our efforts, our resolve, our vigilance."
In releasing the annual report, Mr Powell said that "with every passing month the campaign has intensified" and that for terrorists still on the loose, "life has become harder."
Iran was designated as the most active supporter, with its leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, referring to Israel as a "cancerous tumour," while Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Ministry of Intelligence and Security assisted Lebanese Hezbollah and Palestinian rejectionist groups including Hamas, the annual report said.
Iraq's ties to terror groups, which the US administration cited as one of its reasons for going to war to remove Saddam Hussein, included laying the groundwork for possible attacks on the United States and other Western countries, the report said.
Syria, which Mr Powell is due to visit this week, permits some terror groups to maintain headquarters or offices in Damascus and helps Iran supply Hezbollah via Damascus, the report said.
But the Syrian government insists the offices are involved only in political and informational activities, the report said.
In 2002, there were 199 terror attacks worldwide, a drop of 44 per cent from the 355 attacks recorded in 2001.
A total of 725 people were killed in those attacks last year, far below the 3,295 - including thousands in the September 11th attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania - who died in 2001.
The bombing in Bali in October, which killed 202 people, mostly foreign tourists, was the deadliest terror attack since the September 11th attacks.
AP