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| Down Under |
| Australia monitoring suspected terror cell |
| 2007-07-10 |
| A POTENTIAL terrorist threat could be posed by a group of 20 to 25 Australian men and women now under constant surveillance, according to an intelligence source. The intelligence source and several government figures have told The Bulletin magazine that the "highly dangerous" group has been assessed as posing a potential terrorist threat to national security. The group is the subject of detailed counter-intelligence phone, email and mail intercepts, and constant surveillance, The Bulletin reports. "Have those 20 or 25 people been in contact with a bombmaker or vice versa? No," the intelligence source is quoted as saying. "But that is what authorities are on the lookout for. "The public might assume that bombmaking is simple. Well, it is simple to make a simple bomb, but the truly effective VBIEDs (vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices) take some expertise - the sort of expertise gained in Iraq and Afghanistan." The people do not include the doctors recently questioned in relation to the British bombs, the magazine reports. A government figure privy to Australia's tightly held counter-terrorism intelligence assessments is quoted as saying: "We don't have any specific intelligence on any plot. But there are people in Australia, perhaps 22 to 25, who we know have evil intentions and who are capable of carrying out very bad acts." Intelligence officials believe the APEC meeting later this year would be an appealing target, the magazine says. Asia Pacific leaders will converge on Sydney in September for the meeting. Security will be especially tight when 21 world leaders, including United States President George W Bush, Chinese President Hu Jintao and Russian President Vladimir Putin, attend the APEC leaders summit on the weekend of September 8 and 9. |
| Posted by:Oztralian |
| #1 20 to 25 Australian men and women with names like Clive, Nigel and Hazel, no doubt. |
| Posted by: PlanetDan 2007-07-10 18:09 |