UPDATED: Afghan refugee drove into Melbourne pedestrians to protest "mistreatment of Muslims"

Walt is just getting the news from Down Under -- i.e. Australia, specifically Melborune -- where a man drove an SUV through a crowd of pedestrians at one of the city's busiest street corners earlier today. 19 people were injured, four of them critically. Have you jumped to any conclusions yet? Have words like "terrorism", "Muslim" and/or "Islamic" sprung to your mind? How about "Allahu akbar!"?

So far there have been no reports of "God is great!" or any Arabic or other version thereof having been yelled by the perp, but Inspector Bruce Knacker is calling the "incident" on Flinders Street a "deliberate act". When asked about the motivation of the driver, the coppers said they "have no indication that it is connected to terrorism." The driver, who was arrested at the scene, was known to authorities, a top cop told reporters, but apparently not so well known as to be identified by name!

The man "has a history of drug use and mental illness," said Acting Chief Commissioner Shane Patton, as well as "historical assault" convictions. Although ACC Patton wouldn't give out the name of the driver, the Melbourne Herald Sun identified him as "ice-addicted, Afghan-Australian Saeed Noori."

Although Australia has no equivalent to Canada's M-103 which "discourages" any mention of anything which would fan the flames of Islamophobia, Aussie police appear to have received the same memo as the Canadian police who deemed it politically incorrect to reveal the name, ethnicity, religion or citizenship status of the man who burst into a Vaughan ON bank last Friday demanding drugs and a telephone call to President Trump. The man, who may (or may not) have had a history of drug use and mental illness was shot dead by the Canuck cops. See "Canuck cops cover up terror attack outside Toronto", WWW 16/12/17.

Mr Noori got off lightly. An off-duty police sergeant shopping nearby was the first to arrive at the scene, taking hold of the driver seconds after his SUV crashed into a bus stop. Footage from a local TV station showed uniformed cops dragging him from the crumpled vehicle and cuffing him a short time later.

UPDATE ADDED 22/12/17: The Melbourne Herald Sun, the first to identify the attacker as Saeed Noori, persuaded the chief inspector of the Victoria State Police to walk back earlier statements that the coppers knew of no reason for the terrorist crime or of what might have motivated the "Afghan-Australian" driver of the vehicle to ram it into a crowd of pedestrians.

The latest version of the official story is that Mr Noori is an Afghan refugee -- not a citizen as the phrase "Afghan-Australian" was meant to suggest -- and "attributed his actions to perceived mistreatment of Muslims." The top cop said that when the perp was interviewed (see picture above), he "spoke about dreams, he spoke about voices...but he also did attribute some of his actions to the poor treatment of Muslims. I don't know the exact detail, to do with Allah [like "Allahu akbar!"? Ed.] and some ramblings about ASIO (the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation)."

Asked if there were links to terrorism, Acting Chief Commissioner Shane Patton -- for it was he -- said, "That's certainly one area we're exploring in respect to motivation." Another stunning example of the greatest oxymoron of all -- "police intelligence".

Aussies foil Islamic terrorist plot to bring down an airliner

Walt takes off his hat -- the one with the corks dangling from the rim -- to the Australian rozzers (= police) and government for their candour in saying, right off the bat, that they believe "Islamic-inspired terrorism" is behind the plot to bring down an airplane, foiled by the arrest of four men in raids on Sydney homes this weekend.

Aussie Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that security has been increased at Sydney Airport since Thursday because of the plot. "I can report last night that there has been a major joint counterterrorism operation to disrupt a terrorist plot to bring down an airplane," he told reporters. "The operation is continuing."

Federal Police Commissioner Andrew Colvin said he didn't yet have a lot of detail on the specifics of the attack, the location and timing. He could say only that "in recent days, law enforcement has been become aware of information that suggested some people in Sydney were planning to commit a terrorist attack using an improvised device." But, when asked if ISIS was behind the plot, Mr Colvin was politically incorrect enough to say, "We believe it's Islamic-inspired terrorism."

AP quoted Greg Barton, a "security expert" with Deakin University in Melbourne, as saying that the first plot to target aircraft in Australia, which is the highest aspiration of many extremists, was a "pretty big threshold moment." He went on to say that the plotters were apparently making a peroxide-based explosive device rather than using nitrate-based chemicals that can be detected by airport security swab tests.

Islamic fanatic Salman Abedi used a peroxide-based explosive, triacetone triperoxide, better known as TATP, to kill 22 concert-goers in Manchester, UK, just over two months ago. According to Prof. Barton, "TATP is called 'Mother of Satan' because it often kills the bomb maker because it's very unstable as it's mixed. But if it's mixed well, it can be very potent and a small amount can be enough to bring an aircraft down if it's done very, very expertly."

The plan most likely was to take the explosive on board in carry-on luggage unless there was a baggage handler involved who could ensure that a stowed bomb exploded near the fuselage where it would be most damaging. This may be the method used to cause the crash of Egyptian Airlines flight MS804 in May of 2016. French investigators called it an accident, but Walt suggests taking their findings cum grano salis. See "MS804: Where there's smoke there's fire", WWW 21/5/16.

Names of the four Mohammeds ["men", shurely! Ed.] arrested (but not yet charged) have yet to be released. Walt presumes they are, at this very moment, "helping police with their investigations". May I suggest that before the coppers put the rubber hoses away, they ask the detainees what they know about MS804, and, while they're at it, MH370. Sooner or later, the pieces of the Islamic jigsaw puzzle must fit together!

"Australia first!" - Oz to introduce values tests for would-be citizens

Seems Australians, unlike their Canadian cousins, have had enough of celebrating diversity and welcoming all comers to the fair land of Oz. No "Ministry of Refugees" for them! In fact, the Australian government plans to reform its immigration programme by lengthening the waiting period for citizenship, adding a new "Australian values" test and raising the standard for English language ability.

While announcing the end of an overly generous temporary worker programme, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said the time had come to "put Australia first." The current immigration process, he said, was mainly "administrative" while the citizenship test is largely "a civics test." The current multiple-choice questionnaire tests a person's knowledge of Australian laws, national symbols and colours of the Aboriginal flag, but Mr Turnbull said it was not adequate to judge whether a person would accept Australian values.

"If we believe that respect for women and children and saying no to violence...is an Australian value, and it is," he explained, "then why should that not be made a key part, a fundamental part, a very prominent part, of our process to be an Australian citizen? Why should the test simply be a checklist of civic questions?"

The new citizenship test will include questions about whether applicants have sent their kids to school, whether they go to work, and whether they think it's consistent with Australian values to become part of unruly gangs. "We’re standing up for Australian values and the parliament should do so too," said the PM.

On the question of language, Mr Turnbull said basic English would no longer be sufficient to become an Australian citizen under the new test. New applicants need a minimum level 6.0 equivalent of the IELTS (International English Language Testing System), and will only become eligible for citizenship after four years as a permanent resident, up from one year. He told reporters in Canberra, "I reckon if we went out today and said to Australians, 'Do you think you could become an Australian citizen without being able to speak English?', they’d say, 'You’re kidding. Surely you’d have to be able to speak English.'" Just like the gentleman in the drawing at right.*

"What we are doing," Mr Turnbull said, "is strengthening our multicultural society and strengthening our values." Turnbull told reporters in Canberra. “Australian citizenship should be honoured, cherished. It’s a privilege."

* Note from Ed: Australian English is a dialect, or at least a variant, which is unintelligible to non-residents of the Antipodes. It is sometimes known as "Strine", from the way native speakers pronounce the RSE "strain". You can look it up in The Oxford Companion to the English Language.