A female genital mutilation survivor has spoken out about being attacked on a London bus by a woman whose child she had told that FGM was a form of abuse.

Hibo Wardere, 46, fled Somalia’s civil war when she was 18, 12 years after suffering FGM - the brutal and potentially lethal practice which occurs in the UK every 96 minutes.

The mother-of-four now visits schools educating children about the barbaric tradition, which angered her attacker who seized the opportunity to confront her after spotting Ms Wardere on the bus.

Hibo Wardere, 46, had a scary confrontation with a woman whose child she had spoken to about FGM. Ms Wardere fled Somalia when she was 18, 12 years after she suffered FGM

Ms Wardere told The Evening Standard: 'I had a scary confrontation on the 257 bus in Walthamstow'.

'A woman with a full niqab recognised me and ran at me screaming my name and snarling, "You came to my child’s school, you told her FGM was abuse".

'I could only see her eyes but they were full of rage.

'She was so angry she had to be dragged off the bus, but I was jumping for joy inside because that meant a child had confronted their parent.'

From July to September 2015 there were 1,385 new cases of FGM reported at hospitals and GPs in England (file image posed by model)

Some 5,484 instances of FGM were reported from October 2014 to September 2015, and experts say many other victims go unreported.

Tanya Barron, chief executive of Plan UK, the charity which campaigns against FGM, said: ‘FGM has been a hidden danger – only now is the full scale becoming clear.

'Recognising that FGM is a fundamental abuse of girls’ rights is the first step to ending the practice.’

She warned that many more ‘unseen’ cases are not found in data from the Health and Social Care Information Centre.

This graphic from research by City University London earlier this year shows that women who have undergone female genital mutilation are living in virtually every part of England and Wales

The data, released ahead of the International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM on February 6, show that 1,385 cases were reported between July and September.

Some 758 were in London with the next biggest cluster (227) in the Midlands and east of England.

Ms Wardere is pressuring the Government for the dangers of FGM to be put on the national curriculum so that the UK 'can raise an entire generation to protect themselves'.

Her memoir, Cut: One Woman’s Fight against FGM in Britain Today, is published on Thursday.