 |
| Update: Security forces have stormed the cafe, ending a siege that lasted for over 16 hours. Police identified the hostage-taker as Man Haron Monis, an Iranian who sought political asylum in Australia in 1996. |
Police and security officers evacuated the area around Martin Place and ordered trains at the nearby underground railway station not to stop. The police confirmed to journalists that an “armed offender” was inside the café, but did not say how many hostages were held. A Lindt executive put the number at about ten staff and 30 customers, though five people fled from the building in the late afternoon. About seven hours into the siege the police said it had made contact with the hostage-taker.
At first authorities resisted calling it a terrorist attack. The flag in the café window turned out not to belong to Islamic State (IS), as some early reports suggested. Instead, experts identified it as a shahada flag, expressing faith in Islam. Security chiefs briefed the national security committee of Australia’s federal cabinet. Tony Abbott, the prime minister, later called the siege, by an armed person “claiming political motivation”, a “very disturbing incident”. But he urged Australians to “go about their business as usual”.
Yet the siege has been hard to ignore. The street and its surroundings are home to some of Australia’s best-known buildings, including the Reserve Bank of Australia, the central bank, and the Parliament of New South Wales. The American consulate and some big bank headquarters are nearby. The Sydney Opera House, the Circular Quay ferry terminal and other Sydney landmarks are a short walk away. The country’s Muslim leaders condemned the siege. Some offered authorities their help.
Earlier in the day, police arrested a 25-year-old man in a north-western suburb of Sydney in connection with investigations into planning a terrorist attack in Australia. The police said this arrest had no connection with the Martin Place siege, whose perpetrator they say they have the name of, but will not divulge. Yet both incidents have unfolded amid intense debate in Australia about the lengths to which the country should go in its response to terrorism.
In September police and intelligence officers conducted anti-terror raids in Sydney and Brisbane, arresting one man. Mr Abbott claimed these raids had foiled an IS plot to carry out “demonstration executions” in Australia. In the same month Australia committed air force planes and troops to the Middle East in the fight against IS. In October Mr Abbott’s conservative coalition government pushed through Parliament new laws expanding the powers of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, including access to computer networks. Most controversially, under the new laws journalists could be jailed for up to ten years for disclosing intelligence operations.
Islam is one of Australia’s fastest-growing religions. Thanks to immigration, the number of Muslims in the country grew by two-thirds in the decade to 2011. Muslims now account for just over 2% of the country’s population of 23m, many of them in the outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne. Since the rise of IS, debate has grown in Australia over the influence of jihadist groups on young Muslims. The government claims that at least 60 Australians have left the country to fight in Syria and Iraq; that about 100 are supporting them; and that 20 fighters have returned to Australia.
The Sydney siege is the first terrorist act in Australia in which a political message about Islam has been central. It is unclear whether the hostage-taker is a lone wolf disaffected with society or a member of an organised group of radicals. Greg Barton, a terrorism expert at Monash University in Melbourne, says the hostage-taking is consistent with undirected attacks that IS has encouraged in other countries—a new trend in jihadist violence that may now have reached Australia.
Article from Economist
Tags
International