International

School girl arrested in Australia on terror charges

Published

8 years ago

March 22, 2016

School girl arrested in Australia on terror charges

Australia police, as part of counterterrorism operations, arrested a 16-year-old schoolgirl and a 20-year-old man in Sydney for funding ISIS.

The identities of the two suspects were not disclosed but authorities say the man had been previously arrested during the country’s largest counterterrorism raids back in September 2014.

According to Australia’s anti-money laundering agency, reports of suspected funding of terror groups have tripled in the last one year, and the sum of $38 million of such funds raised to support ISIS is being probed.

Read also: Australian couple kidnapped in B’Faso: Wife released “We anticipate that both these people will be charged later today and attend court and the charge that we anticipate they will have is one of financing terrorism,” New South Wales state police Deputy Commissioner Catherine Burn, said, according to Reuters. “We will be alleging that they were involved in obtaining money to send offshore to assist the Islamic State in its activities.”

“The 16-year-old girl is not somebody who is well-known to us, however it is disturbing that we are continuing to see a trend of teenage children involved in activities that they should really not be involved in at all.”

And in a bid to douse fears of a possible attack, Australian Federal Police Deputy Commissioner Michael Phelan said the latest arrests were not connected to any threat of an imminent attack inside the country.

Deputy Commissioner Catherine Burn said counter-terrorism police had been investigating the man from the start of Operation Appleby but the girl was not somebody who was well known to police.

“We will be alleging, of course, that her involvement in a terrorism offence is an extremely serious matter and that will now be up for the courts to determine what happens next,” she said.

She said police were trying to identify “all those things that might have been involved in her getting into this position”.

Join the conversation

Opinions

Support Ripples Nigeria, hold up solutions journalism

Balanced, fearless journalism driven by data comes at huge financial costs.

As a media platform, we hold leadership accountable and will not trade the right to press freedom and free speech for a piece of cake.

If you like what we do, and are ready to uphold solutions journalism, kindly donate to the Ripples Nigeria cause.

Your support would help to ensure that citizens and institutions continue to have free access to credible and reliable information for societal development.

Donate Now