Wieambilla police killings domestic terror, says ASIO

The Wieambilla police killings have been classified by the ASIO as ‘an act of politically motivated violence, primarily motivated by a Christian violent extremist ideology’.

Police officers hold portraits of Constable Matthew Arnold and Constable Rachel McCrow, who were killed at Wieambilla. Picture: Steve Pohlner

The deadly shooting of two Queensland police officers in the rural town of Wieambilla has been classified by the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation as “an act of politically motivated violence, primarily motivated by a Christian violent extremist ideology”.

In his annual threat assessment speech on Tuesday night, spy chief Mike Burgess confirmed ASIO had reached an “independent but identical conclusion” to the Queensland Police Service, which last week described the shootings as a “religiously motivated terror attack”.

Mr Burgess said ASIO did not “find evidence the killers embraced a racist and nationalist ideology or were Sovereign Citizens, despite their anti-authority and conspiratorial beliefs”.

“It’s disappointing some commentators and self-proclaimed terrorism experts were so quick to make definitive declarations about motivations, ideologies and political alignments in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy. Proper, sober, accurate assessments require time and multiple inputs, including intelligence,” Mr Burgess said.

ASIO worked with Queensland police to investigate what motivated Nathaniel, Gareth and Stacey Train to fatally shoot Constable Matthew Arnold, Constable Rachel McCrow and neighbour Alan Dare on December 12.

Mr Burgess said he was concerned that “all too often commentators fail to distinguish between extreme views and violent extremism”.

“One can lead to the other, but that does not mean they are the same thing. It takes careful, nuanced work to disentangle groups and individuals that will engage in violence, from groups and individuals that may have views that are awful – but still lawful,” he said.

“It is equally critical to understand that every ideologically motivated extremist is not automatically a left-wing or right-wing extremist. There is a cohort of individuals motivated by a toxic cocktail of conspiracies, grievances and anti-authority beliefs.

“It is neither helpful nor accurate to reflexively assign these individuals to a place on the political spectrum. These are not simply semantic or academic distinctions. Words matter. Facts matter. Actions matter. If we, as a community, persist in getting the diagnosis wrong, we will struggle to find a cure.”

The Wieambilla shootings came a few weeks after Mr Burgess announced ASIO had lowered the national domestic terrorism threat level from “probable to possible”. He cautioned that while there were fewer extremists with the intention to conduct an attack onshore than when the threat level was raised in 2014, “this does not mean the threat is extinguished … far from it”.

“It is almost guaranteed that there will be a moment when a director-general of security will be standing here to advise that the domestic terrorism threat level is being raised again,” he said.

“The horrific Wieambilla case demonstrates how, even with a lower threat level, the counter-terrorism mission remains challenging and the operational tempo is not diminishing. Significant challenges and changes in the onshore security environment are adding to its complexity.

“The reach of extremist content online means individuals are radicalising very quickly – in days and weeks – so the time between flash to bang is shorter than ever. The radicalisation of minors is another concerning trend.”