Friday November 9, 2018
Australian police on Friday said a Somali man, who stabbed three people in the city of Melbourne on Friday, drove a car laden with gas cylinders which later caught fire and that they are treating the incident as a terror attack, claimed by Daesh.
The suspect stabbed three people, killing one, before he was shot by police. He later died in hospital, Victoria Police Commissioner Graham Ashton told reporters.
"We don't believe there is an ongoing threat at this stage, but certainly we are treating it as a terrorism incident," Ashton said.
He declined to identify the attacker, but said he was Somali with "family associations that are well known to us."
"The perpetrator of the operation... in Melbourne... was an Islamic State (Daesh) fighter and carried out the operation... to target nationals of the coalition" fighting Daesh, Amaq reported a militant security source as saying.
Ashton added that security arrangements at Remembrance Day memorials and other public events scheduled over the weekend will be reassessed and it was likely police numbers there boosted.
Video posted to Twitter and broadcast on television showed a man repeatedly swinging an object at two police officers in the downtown area of the city.
One of the officers raises his weapon, a shot is heard and the man falls to the ground clutching his chest.