A father and son accused of a mass shooting at Australia\u2019s Bondi Beach \u201cacted alone\u201d and were not part of a wider terrorist cell, police said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Sajid Akram and his son Naveed allegedly killed 15 people in an ISIS-inspired attack targeting a Jewish festival on December 14.<\/p>\n
The pair travelled to the southern Philippines in the weeks before shooting, fuelling suspicions they may be linked to extremists.<\/p>\n
Australian Federal Police commissioner Krissy Barrett said so far, this did not appear to be the case.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese individuals are alleged to have acted alone,\u201d she told reporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is no evidence to suggest these alleged offenders were part of a broader terrorist cell, or were directed by others to carry out the attack.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barrett said police would continue to probe why the pair travelled to the city of Davao, where CCTV showed they barely left their budget hotel.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to be clear. I am not suggesting they were there for tourism,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Police believe the duo \u201cmeticulously planned\u201d the attack for months, and have released pictures showing them training with shotguns in the Australian countryside.<\/p>\n
They also recorded a video in October railing against \u201cZionists\u201d while sitting in front of a flag of the Islamic State group, police have said.<\/p>\n
Sajid Akram, 50, was shot and killed by police during the attack. An Indian national, he entered Australia on a visa in 1998.<\/p>\n
Gun crackdown
\nHis 24-year-old son, Naveed, an Australian-born citizen, remains in custody charged with 15 murders and a litany of other serious offences.<\/p>\n
New Year\u2019s Eve parties across Sydney will pause at 11pm (5pm PKT) on Wednesday for a minute of silence in memory of the victims.<\/p>\n
Crowds will be watched over by squads of police carrying high-powered firearms, New South Wales state premier Chris Minns said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is a clear and deliberate message from the police that safety is the number one priority,\u201d he told reporters.<\/p>\n
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced a nationwide crackdown on gun ownership and hate speech in the wake of the attack, promising stricter laws and harsher penalties.<\/p>\n
He has announced a sweeping buyback scheme to \u201cget guns off our streets\u201d.<\/p>\n
It is the largest gun buyback since 1996, when Australia tightened firearms laws in the wake of a mass shooting that killed 35 people at Port Arthur.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A father and son accused of a mass shooting at Australia\u2019s Bondi Beach \u201cacted alone\u201d and were not part of a wider terrorist cell, police said on Tuesday. Sajid Akram and his son Naveed allegedly killed 15 people in an ISIS-inspired attack targeting a Jewish festival on December 14. The pair travelled to the southern […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14742,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14741"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14743,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14741\/revisions\/14743"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14742"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/weeklyyoung.pk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}