Malaysian Police Foil Terror Plans for ’ISIL’-Inspired Attacks

Local Editor

Malaysian police have foiled plans for a wave of bombings drawn up by extreme militants inspired by the so-called "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" [ISIL] in Iraq, a top counter-terrorism official said on Tuesday.

The 19 suspected militants, all Malaysians, had visions of establishing a hardline Southeast Asian so-called "Islamic caliphate" spanning Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Singapore,  said deputy chief of the Malaysian police counter-terrorism division, Ayob Khan Mydin.
They also planned to travel to Syria to learn from the ISIL, he added.

The suspected militants arrested from April-June were formulating plans to bomb pubs, discos and a Malaysian brewery of Danish beer producer Carlsberg, said deputy chief of the Malaysian police counter-terrorism division, said Mydin.

Some had begun raising money -- including via Facebook -- to travel to Syria, typically under the pretext of "humanitarian work," he said.

"From interrogating them, they talk about ISIL ideology, including the killing of innocent people and also Muslims who are not in their group," he said.

Mydin said the suspects also had hoped to create networks with regional and global ISIL cells.
He further added that police believe up to 40 Malaysians have gone to Syria to join the conflict there.

As Mydin said, the suspected militants were only in the early stages of discussing their plans and did not have heavy weapons or bomb-making knowledge.

Seven have already been charged with offences ranging from promoting terrorism to possession of home-made rifles.

They planned "a campaign of violence and armed struggle and to die as martyrs," Mydin said, adding police believe there could still be co-plotters at large in Malaysia.

Moreover, some of those arrested were apprehended at airports on the way to Turkey and Syria to seek training and other support from ISIL.

ISIL has come to have thousands of fighters in Syria and Iraq, some of them Westerners, overrunning large swathes of Iraq as it wages a ruthless campaign to establish a so-called "Islamic caliphate."

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team