Free Republic

THE arrest of a Sydney student on terrorism training charges has intensified the police focus on four Sydney men allegedly linked to a Pakistan-based terror cell that ASIO suspects plotted to bomb Australian military bases last year. Fourth-year medical student Izhar Ul-Haque has spent his second night in the nation's highest-security prison, the Supermax at Goulburn, after becoming only the second person charged in Australia with terrorism offences since the 1978 Hilton bombing. NSW Premier Bob Carr confirmed yesterday that his Government had been asked to make preparations to house more than one suspect in its prison system. "We were...

CANBERRA: The first arrest made under Australia's new anti-terrorism laws, in fact the first Australian since 1978 to be charged with terrorism is a Pakistan-born medical student who allegedly attended a three-week training camp organised by the Lashkar-e-Toiba in Pakistan in January last year. Sydney resident Izhar Ul-Haque was arrested by the Australian Federal Police on April 15 and although he was released on bail on May 27, he is said to be under close observation. His lawyer has denied he was a terrorist but admitted that Ul-Haque was sympathetic to the “Kashmir cause''. Ul-Haque is said to have claimed...