Neil Prakash’s long road to hell from Melbourne boy to jihadi
Homegrown jihadi Neil Prakash went from a Melbourne boy to the country’s most-wanted terrorist after converting to Islam in 2012 and becoming radicalised at the Al-Furqan bookshop in Springvale.
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Neil Prakash went from a Melbourne boy to the country’s most-wanted terrorist.
The homegrown jihadi was born locally to a Fijian father and Cambodian mother in 1991.
The 27-year-old converted to Islam in August 2012 and was radicalised at the Al-Furqan bookshop in Springvale — the same place as fellow extremist Numan Haider, who was shot dead after brutally attacking and almost killing two police officers at Endeavour Hills in 2015.
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Prakash later went to Malaysia where he got a fake passport and identification papers before flying to Turkey in 2015.
About the same time, he emerged as Australia’s number one terror target.
Police issued a warrant for his arrest over his involvement in the Anzac Day terror plot, where a group of young men planned to attack crowds at the 2015 centenary event in Melbourne.
He eventually crossed the border into Syria where he falsely claimed to support Ahrar al-Sham, a jihadist group who fight the Assad regimen and Islamic State.
He joined a training camp but left to join IS. He had two weeks’ military training for IS before being sent to the frontline to fight Kurdish soldiers.
During combat he received injuries to his arm and chest and asked to be transferred. His request was denied and he was ordered to continue fighting, prompting him to flee.
In April, 2016 the Australian Government said US authorities had told it Prakash had been killed in a US drone strike in Mosul, Iraq.
However, authorities found out several months later he had survived the strike and had been injured.
He then paid people smugglers $4000 to get him out of Syria. But on October, 2016 he was captured by soldiers while crossing into Turkish territory after a tip-off by Australian security agencies.
While in Syria Prakash appeared in propaganda videos, which he claimed he was forced to recruit foreign-born fighters to join IS.
He faces local terrorism charges of committing crimes against the state of Turkey by being a member of a terrorist organisation, which carries a penalty of between seven-and-a-half to 15 years’ jail.
In May, then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull said he should be returned to Australia to face justice. An extradition order was later rejected by a Turkish court.
A year later it emerged Prakash fathered three children while fighting for IS.
