SYDNEY/MELBOURNE: A Somali-born man set fire to a pick-up truck laden with gas cylinders in the centre of the Australian city of Melbourne on Friday and stabbed three people, killing one, before he was shot by police in a rampage they called an act of terrorism.
IS claimed responsibility for the attack, without providing any evidence.
The utility truck carrying barbecue gas cylinders burned on busy Bourke Street just before the evening rush hour as the driver stabbed bystanders and attacked police. The cylinders did not explode and the fire was put out in 10 minutes, by which point the attack was over.
“We are still trying to piece together whether the vehicle was lit, then he got out the car or whether he got out of the car and then the vehicle took flame,” Victoria Police Commissioner Graham Ashton told reporters.
Video posted to Twitter and broadcast on television showed the man swinging a knife at two police officers, while his truck burned in the background.
One of the officers shot the man and he collapsed to the ground clutching his chest, the video showed. Other footage showed two stab victims lying on the ground nearby.
The attacker, who police said was 31, died in hospital, as did one of the victims, Ashton said. “From what we know of that individual, we are treating this as a terrorism incident,” he said of the attacker.
Asked about what the attacker had been planning, Ashton referred to the gas cylinders in the car and said: “You could make certain assumptions from that.” Victoria police declined to comment when contacted about IS’s claim. The militant group also claimed responsibility for a deadly siege in the city in 2017 when a Somali man was killed by police after taking a woman hostage. — Reuters
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