A 16-year-old boy armed with a knife was shot lifeless by police after he stabbed a person within the Australian west coast metropolis of Perth, officers mentioned Sunday.
The incident occurred within the parking zone of a ironmongery store in suburban Willetton on Saturday night time.
The teenager attacked the person after which rushed at cops earlier than he was shot, Western Australian Premier Roger Cook dinner advised reporters on Sunday.
“There are indications he had been radicalized on-line,” Cook dinner advised a information convention.
“However I need to reassure the neighborhood at this stage it seems that he acted solely and alone,” Cook dinner added.
A person in his 30s was discovered on the scene with a stab wound to his again. He was taken to a hospital in severe however steady situation, a police assertion mentioned.
third high-profile stabbing in current weeks
It comes after Australian police mentioned the attacker who fatally stabbed six folks at a busy buying centre in Sydney’s seashore suburb of Bondi might have focused girls.
Police and Australian Safety Intelligence Group brokers have additionally been conducting a counterterrorism investigation within the east coast metropolis of Sydney since one other 16-year-old boy stabbed an Assyrian Orthodox bishop and priest in a church on April 15.
That boy has been charged with committing a terrorist act. Six of his alleged associates have additionally been charged with a variety of offences, together with conspiring to have interaction in or planning a terrorist act. All stay in custody.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese mentioned he had been briefed on the most recent stabbing in Perth by Australian Federal Police commissioner Reece Kershaw and ASIO director common Mike Burgess, who heads the nation’s primary home spy company.
“I am suggested there isn’t a ongoing risk to the neighborhood on the data out there,” Albanese mentioned.
“We’re a peace-loving nation and there’s no place for violent extremism in Australia,” he added.
Boy’s behaviour flagged
Police obtained an emergency telephone name after 10 p.m. from a teen saying he was going to commit acts of violence, Western Australian police commissioner Col Blanch mentioned.
The boy had been collaborating in a program for younger folks vulnerable to radicalization, Blanch added.
“I do not need to say he has been radicalized or is radicalized as a result of I believe that types a part of the investigation,” he mentioned.
Police mentioned they had been later alerted by a telephone name from a member of the general public {that a} knife assault was underway within the parking zone. Three cops responded, one armed with a gun and two with performed power units.
Police deployed each performed power units however they didn’t incapacitate the boy earlier than he was killed by a single gunshot, Blanch mentioned.
Blanch mentioned members of the native Muslim neighborhood had raised considerations with police in regards to the boy’s behaviour earlier than he was killed on Saturday.
‘No place for violence in Islam’
The imam of Perth’s largest mosque, the Nasir Mosque, condemned the stabbing.
“There isn’t a place for violence in Islam,” Imam Syed Wadood Janud mentioned in an announcement.
“We recognize the hassle of the police to maintain our communities secure. I additionally need to commend the native Muslim neighborhood who had flagged the person prior with the police,” Wadood added.
Some Muslim leaders have criticized Australian police for declaring final month’s church stabbing a terrorist act however not a rampage two days earlier in a Sydney shopping center through which six folks had been killed and a dozen wounded. The 40-year-old attacker within the mall assault was shot lifeless by police. Police have but to disclose the person’s motive.
The church assault was the third to be categorized by Australian authorities as a terrorist act since 2018.
In December 2022, three Christian fundamentalists shot lifeless two cops and a bystander in an ambush close to the neighborhood of Wieambilla in Queensland state. The shooters had been later killed by police.
In November 2018, a Somalia-born Muslim stabbed three pedestrians in downtown Melbourne, killing one, earlier than police shot him lifeless.