Australia’s only nuclear reactor was a possible target for alleged Islamic militants arrested for plotting a major attack, it was revealed on Monday.
In a 21-page report, police investigators said members of the terror cell were stockpiling bomb-making materials and training in outback hunting camps as well as sizing up a possible strike on the reactor, which is just 40km from the centre of Sydney.
The revelation coincided with a fresh terror alert on Monday in Brisbane, Australia’s third-biggest city, after a series of anonymous bomb threats paralysed its public transport network for half an hour. The Queensland state Premier, Peter Beattie, apologised but said the threats had to be taken seriously. The alleged nuclear plot was included in a police report presented to Sydney’s central local court on Friday, the details of which only emerged on Monday.
The court hearing followed last week’s raids in Sydney and Melbourne that led to the arrest of 18 men on charges of planning a terror attack. Police on Monday night confirmed that a group of men with links to those arrested in Sydney were under 24-hour surveillance, amid fears that members of the alleged cell were still at large.
Details included in the police document alleged that three of the suspects — Mazen Touma, Mohammed Elomar and Abdul Rakib Hasan — were stopped by police in a car near the Lucas Heights reactor last December. The men had a trail bike and claimed they were there to ride it. But according to the fact sheet, when interviewed separately each gave a different version of the day’s events to police.
”Police inquiries revealed the access lock for a gate to a reservoir of the reactor had recently been cut,” the fact sheet said.
The Lucas Heights reactor, which uses small amounts of uranium to manufacture medicines and for scientific research, was also involved in the recent case of French terror suspect Willie Brigitte, who has been held by French authorities since he was deported from Australia in October 2003. Australian newspapers have said he may have been planning to attack the reactor and was passing on bomb-making skills to two Australians.
The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (Ansto) and the government have continued to defend security at the reactor. Ian Smith, the head of the nuclear agency, said Ansto liaises regularly with intelligence agencies to assess threats and meets global security standards for storing nuclear materials.
”We have an in-depth security system which is equivalent to the best international protection for nuclear facilities,” Smith told ABC Radio.
According to police, the men arrested last week were a sub-group of the Ahel al Sunna wal Jamaah Association, a Sunni Islamic group that follows a fundamentalist jihad ideology. The men attended training camps in March and April this year at properties near Bourke, in New South Wales. Between August and November, it is alleged that the men bought or ordered hundreds of litres of chemicals, steel drums, batteries, plastic piping, circuit kits, stop watches and ammunition.
During raids on the men’s homes police also found 165 railway detonators, bomb-making instructions in Arabic and videos entitled Sheikh Osama’s Training Course and Are You Ready to Die?. The court document said Abdul Nacer Benbrika, the Muslim cleric charged with terrorism offences in Melbourne, told them they should inflict ”maximum damage”. — Guardian Unlimited Â