Australian Police Arrest Terrorism Suspect
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SYDNEY, Australia — Police have arrested a man suspected of planning to bomb Israeli diplomatic posts in Australia, the suspect’s attorney said today.
The man was identified by his attorney as Jack Roche, 49, a convert to Islam who claims he trained with the Al Qaeda terrorist network.
Roche told an Australian newspaper he learned to use explosives in Afghanistan two years ago. The arrest followed nationwide raids by police after an Oct. 12 bombing that killed 191 people, mostly Australians, on the Indonesian island of Bali. Police said the alleged bomb plot is not linked to that attack.
The raids targeted suspected sympathizers of Jemaah Islamiah, an Islamic group suspected of ties to the Bali blast.
Roche, one of many members of Perth’s Muslim community who spoke to media after the raids, had said he met the group’s alleged spiritual leader, Abu Bakar Bashir, in the 1990s when Bashir visited Australia.
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