Three Men Arrested In Australia For Plotting 'IS-Inspired' Terror Attack - Police

Australian police arrested three men who are suspected of plotting a terrorist attack "inspired" by the Islamic State terrorist group (banned in Russia), Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton said Tuesday.

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 20th November, 2018) Australian police arrested three men who are suspected of plotting a terrorist attack "inspired" by the Islamic State terrorist group (banned in Russia), Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton said Tuesday.

"There was a view towards a crowded place, a place where maximum people would be attending to be able to kill, we allege, kill a maximum amount of people as possible ... Certainly, inspired by ISIS, we know that and recently over about the last week we've become a lot more energized," Ashton told reporters.

The individuals were Australian nationals of Turkish background, aged 21, 26 and 30, respectively, Ashton added.

The commissioner specified that they were under investigation since March, and in the last few days, they had attempted to purchase a semi-automatic rifle.

Earlier in November, a man attacked a group of people with a knife after a car burst into flames in Melbourne. The police said that the attacker had been arrested, adding that at least one person had died of wounds and two people had been hospitalized. The police later said that they were treating the attack as a terrorism incident.