Police chiefs step up protection for terror target officers

The nation’s top police chiefs are taking unprecedented steps to protect officers from the threat of terrorism.

Australia’s top three police chiefs have told The Weekend Australian their officers are in the crosshairs of radicals ­inspired by Islamic State.

Police officers have emerged as the target of choice for Islamic State jihadists in the West, prompting the nation’s top police chiefs to take unprecedented steps to protect their officers from the threat of terrorism.

The Weekend Australian understands much of the chatter being detected now by authorities in relation to potential attacks has focused heavily on police.

Australia’s top three police chiefs — Australian Federal Police commissioner Andrew Colvin, acting NSW police commissioner Nick Kaldas and Victoria Police commissioner Graham Ashton — have told The Weekend Australian their officers are in the crosshairs of radicals ­inspired by Islamic State.

“One of the recent trends of terrorism in Australia and around the world is advocating rapid, low-sophistication attacks on police and police employees,” Mr Colvin said. “The targeting of police in this way is a new challenge in this country. However, I am confident Australia’s police are professional, adaptable and capable of responding to this complex and difficult environment.”

Among the new security measures taken by police is an instruction for all uniformed officers to carry their weapons at all times and installing physical protection, such as crash barriers, around police stations.

The heightened security follows a string of attacks on police, most recently the murder of NSW police employee Curtis Cheng outside the headquarters in Sydney’s west at Parramatta, and the near-fatal stabbing attack of two counter-terrorism detectives by teen jihadist Numan Haider in Melbourne in September last year.

The Syrian civil war has led to a surge in extremist activity within Australia’s Islamic community, which in turn has led to a huge counter-terrorism response aimed at thwarting would-be ­attackers. Police and ASIO are conducting widespread surveillance operations across Sydney and Melbourne, the two hot spots for radical activity.

To some degree, Australia’s experience mirrors that of other Western countries, where Muslim extremists have attacked soldiers, police, parliaments or other figures of authority.

In Australia, the attacks on police have been disproportionately high. Aside from the Parramatta murder and the Haider attack, police in April disrupted an alleged plot to run down and kill a police officer on Anzac Day, steal the officer’s weapon and go on a shooting spree.

The wave of attacks follows instructions from top Islamic State officials to followers in the West to conduct opportunistic assaults on nonbelievers, focusing specifically on police, soldiers and intelligence officers.

Mr Colvin’s frank assessment of the security environment facing police was echoed by police chiefs in Australia’s two largest jurisdictions, NSW and Victoria.

Mr Kaldas said he “agreed entirely” that police now faced a new challenge. “I don’t remember this situation happening 10 years ago,” he told The Weekend Australian.

“But like Andrew, I’m very ­confident we have robust ­frameworks and processes for our police to deal with this challenge.”

In Victoria, Mr Ashton said police had to increasingly think of their own safety as well as that of the community they serve.

“Keeping the community safe is our absolute priority,” Mr Ashton told The Weekend Australian.

“But, increasingly, police know they need to be thinking about their own safety, too.”

Mr Ashton said police knew “very small numbers of people” sought to do them harm, prompting Victoria Police to institute measures aimed at managing the new risks.

“But all of this is being balanced carefully to ensure police do not adopt a fortress mentality,” he said. “More than ever, our police need to be out and about in their communities, talking to ­people and making them feel safe. It’s a challenging balance but one we need to get right.”

Mr Kaldas suggested one of the reasons police were being singled out was their accessibility.

“We are of the community, we live them with, we walk among them,” Mr Kaldas said.

“By the same token, because of that interaction and engagement, we have built support for law ­enforcement.”

He denied the attacks on police were a response to heavy-handed policing in southwestern Sydney. “We don’t target people because of their religion, background or nationally,” Mr Kaldas said.

“We target people because of criminality.”

Islamic Council of Victoria spokesman Kuranda Seyit denied the recent attacks on police amounted to a pattern. “We don’t want to see any members of the police force hurt in the line of duty but I don’t think this is a trend,” Mr Seyit told The Weekend Australian. “If you are really talking about trends, the main targets of a lot of these terrorist organisations has been Islamic communities in the Middle East.”