Aussie teens arrested in Melbourne over alleged 'ISIS-inspired' terrorist plot
Five teenagers aged 18 and 19, arrested in the early hours of Saturday in a series of raids in Melbourne, were allegedly planning "atrocious" ISIS-inspired attacks on police and the public next week at Anzac Day events in Australia.
Acting Deputy Commissioner Neil Gaughan of the Australian Federal
Police (AFP) told a news conference in Melbourne that the plan
targeted "ANZAC Day activity in Melbourne which included
targeting police officers." The plot was to have involved
"edged weapons."
"At this stage we have no information that it was a planned
beheading. But there was reference to an attack on police,"
Gaughan stated. "Some evidence that we have collected at a
couple of the scenes, and some other information we have, leads
us to believe that this particular matter was
ISIS-inspired," he added.
Acting Victoria Police Commissioner Tim Cartwright said in
Melbourne that the men were allegedly planning “atrocious
acts.” According to police, the alleged plot could have been
carried any time in the next week. ANZAC Day, which stands for
the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, is celebrated on April
25. It's a national day of remembrance in Australia and New
Zealand marking the date of the first Gallipoli landings in 1915,
in which thousands of soldiers lost their lives fighting against
the Muslim Ottoman Empire, to capture the capital of the Ottoman
Empire, Constantinople.
The suspects included two 18-year-olds, alleged to have been
preparing the attack, another 18-year-old was arrested on weapons
charges, while two other men, aged 18 and 19, were in custody and
assisting police, AP reported. One of the men, Sevdet Besim,
appeared briefly in court on Saturday on a charge of planning a
terrorist act. He didn't apply for bail and was ordered to
reappear in court on April 24.
According to federal Police Deputy Commissioner Michael Phelan,
the teens had links to Abdul Numan Haider, an 18-year-old who
stabbed two Melbourne police officers and was subsequently shot
dead in Endeavour Hills in September.
Federal and Victoria Police officers raided properties across
Melbourne’s southeast early on Saturday, seizing knives and
swords, based on information that attacks were imminent, the
Australian reported.
Capsicum spray (a chemical compound that irritates the eyes to
cause tears, pain, and temporary blindness) was used in the
arrest of one man in counter terrorism raids, Australia's Herald
Sun reported.
“I am aware that OC spray was deployed against one of the
men, that I think, is the extent of the resistance,” Acting
Chief Commissioner Tim Cartwright was quoted as saying.
Three of the five teens were injured, with one claiming he
received a minor head injury.
“High risk searches, high risk raids at three in the morning,
in the dark, I’m not surprised again that some of them needed
medical examination,” Cartwright told the Herald Sun.
Police are currently communicating with the families of the young
men.
“One of the interesting things we see so often in these
investigations, families may not be aware of what’s been going
on," Mr Cartwright noted.
Police said the teens had been on officials' radars for months,
but it was time for action when it turned out they were planning
a specific attack.
"This is a new paradigm for police," Michael Phelan
said. "These types of attacks that are planned are very
rudimentary and simple. ... All you need these days is a knife, a
flag and a camera and one can commit a terrorist act," he
added.
The latest operation involved up to 200 police officers and was
the culmination of a month-long operation code-named Operation
Rising.
Searches at several addresses and investigations are still
continuing, local media reported.
Authorities said that security will be stepped up during the
Anzac Day commemorations, and police presence will be visibly
increased.
Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has meanwhile called on people
not to make judgments about community members, saying that the
young people arrested on Saturday "are not people of faith,
they don’t represent any culture.”
“This is not an issue of how you pray or where you were born.
This is not about those issues. This is simply evil,” he
said.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott said in February that the terrorism
threat in Australia had risen dramatically recently, with
one-third of all terrorism-related arrests since 2001 occurring
in the last six months. At least 110 Australians have gone to
Iraq and Syria to fight alongside extremists, with the nation's
security agency conducting over 400 high-priority
counterterrorism investigations - more than double the number a
year ago, according to Abbott.
