The Australian is reporting today on a disturbing revelation:
A SENIOR counter-terrorism officer with the Australian Federal Police has testified that police were directed to charge “as many suspects as possible” with terrorism offences in order to test the new anti-terrorism laws introduced in 2003.
The admission was made by federal agent Kemuel Lam Paktsun, the senior case officer on the Operation Newport investigation that led to the arrest of Sydney medical student Izhar Ul-Haque, whose trial was sensationally dismissed in the NSW Supreme Court yesterday.
…
“At the time we were directed, we were informed, to lay as many charges under the new terrorist legislation against as many suspects as possible because we wanted to use the new legislation,” Mr Lam Paktsun testified.
“So regardless of the assistance that Mr Ul-Haque could give, he was going to be prosecuted, charged, because we wanted to test the legislation and lay new charges, in our eagerness to use the legislation.”
4 comments ↓
If someone were to tell me that things like this happen in Australia, I would have called them a wacky conspiracy theorist and laughed in their face.
This is amazing. And I mean that in the worst possible way.
We need a change of culture in those directing the AFP - big time!!!
OK it’s pretty disturbing, especially for the people who may have been charged over nothing, for sure. But look at it another way: you live in a country where this has now been exposed and reported, and no one will disappear or be locked up or executed as a consequence of revealing it or criticising the people responsible.
I agree with G-Man. No one is going to “commit suicide” after revealing this information …. eg. Ghazi Kanaan.
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