Bondi Beach gunman will be charged, Australia’s PM says, as funerals begin for victims of the deadly attack on a Jewish celebration.
SYDNEY: One of two men suspected of carrying out Australia’s deadliest mass shooting in three decades will be charged later on Wednesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.
The announcement came as funerals began for the Jewish victims of Sunday’s attack on a Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach.
The alleged father-and-son perpetrators opened fire in an attack that intensified fears of rising antisemitism and violent extremism.
Sajid Akram, 50, was shot dead by police at the scene, while his 24-year-old son, named in local media as Naveed, emerged from a coma on Wednesday.
“He will be charged formally, if he hasn’t been so already, I would expect that will take place over the coming hours,” Albanese said in a podcast interview.
Investigators expect to question the son once medication wears off and legal counsel is present, New South Wales Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon said.
The men accused of carrying out Sunday’s attack had travelled to the southern Philippines weeks before the shooting.
Australian police said the attack appeared to be inspired by Islamic State.
U.S. President Donald Trump told a Hanukkah event he was thinking of the victims of the “horrific and antisemitic terrorist attack”.
A funeral for Rabbi Eli Schlanger, an assistant rabbi at Chabad Bondi Synagogue and a father of five, was held on Wednesday.
Albanese is facing criticism that his centre-left government did not do enough to prevent the spread of antisemitism during the Israel-Gaza war.
“We will work with the Jewish community, we want to stamp out and eradicate antisemitism from our society,” Albanese told reporters.
The government is also under pressure to explain why Sajid Akram was allowed to legally acquire the high-powered rifles and shotguns used in the attack.
Akram’s son was briefly investigated by Australia’s domestic intelligence agency in 2019 over alleged links to Islamic State.
Albanese said there was no evidence at the time he posed a threat.
Ahmed al-Ahmed, 43, the man who tackled one of the shooters to disarm his rifle, was due to undergo surgery on Wednesday.
“We learned through social media. I called his father and he told me that it was Ahmed. Ahmed is a hero, we’re proud of him,” his uncle in Syria told Reuters.
The family of 22-year-old police officer Jack Hibbert, who was shot twice, said he had lost vision in one eye.
Health authorities said 22 people were still in several Sydney hospitals.
Other shooting victims included a Holocaust survivor and a 10-year-old girl named Matilda.
Matilda’s father told a Bondi vigil he did not want his daughter’s legacy to be forgotten.
In Bondi on Wednesday, swimmers gathered on Sydney’s most popular beach and held a minute’s silence.
“Everyone’s grieving, everyone’s understanding and processing it in their own way,” a local man told Reuters. – Reuters
