Six people have been stabbed by a Sri Lankan terrorist in Auckland, New Zealand, who was a “known threat to New Zealand”.
The terrorist, shot dead by police shortly after the attack began, was a “Sri Lankan national” and “obviously was a supporter of ISIS ideology” — that is to say, the interpretation of Islam favour by the Islamic State organisation — according to New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern.
“The individual was under constant monitoring,” Ardern stressed, perhaps seeking to get ahead of critics angry that the migrant was able to strike despite being a “known threat”, adding that “it was the police surveillance team and special tactics group who were part of that monitoring and surveillance that shot and killed him within, I’m told, roughly 60 seconds of the attack starting.”
This may prove cold comfort to the six victims the “constant monitoring” failed to protect, however, three of whom are critically injured and one seriously injured, according to the St John ambulance service.
The left-wing prime minister went out of her way to press home her view that the terrorist was “an individual, not a faith, not a culture, not an ethnicity, but an individual person who was gripped by ideology that is not supported here by anyone or any community” — except, presumably, the other Islamic radicals in the former British colony.
Ardern said that the “detailed reasons he [was] known to the [security] agencies” cannot be revealed at present due to “suppression orders made by the court”, but she is “seeking advice” on what the government can do to increase transparency around the state’s apparent failure to prevent his attack.
She has claimed that the Sri Lankan had not committed any offences which would have allowed for him to be in custody rather than walking the streets, however, telling that press that “If he had committed a criminal act that would have allowed him to be in prison, that’s where he would have been.”
However, The New Zealand Herald claims that the authorities did try to prosecute the migrant, who they name as ‘S’, under the Terrorism Suppression Act last year, but “a High Court judge ruled that preparing a terrorist attack was not in itself an offence under the legislation.”
‘S’ was instead prosecuted for lesser charges of possessing Islamic State propaganda, but was only sentenced to a year of supervision at a West Auckland mosque.
‘S’ was also given an “official warning” by police for posting “staunchly anti-Western and violent” material on Facebook, including “videos and pictures depicting graphic war-related violence, comments advocating for violent extremism and support for Isis terrorists involved in the Paris attacks in November 2015 and the Brussels bombing in March 2016”, and a threat to “find kiwi scums in my country” and “show them … what will happen when you mess with [me] while I’m in their country.”
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