Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese speaks to the media about the Bondi Junction stabbings, during a press conference in Canberra, Australia, on April 13,. The country was reacting to yet another stabbing Saturday night in Perth. Photo by Lukas Coch/EPA-EFE
May 5 (UPI) — Australian police shot and killed a 16-year-old following a stabbing attack that had “hallmarks” of terror, officials confirmed Sunday. The teenager attacked a man in a suburb of Perth Saturday night.
“It’s a very tragic event in Western Australia,” Police Commissioner Col Blanch said at a news conference Sunday morning. “It saddens me that I have to be here today talking about this incident.”
Officers were called to the scene about 10:15 p.m. local time Saturday by a witness reporting a man armed with a knife in a parking garage in Perth.
Responding officers drew tasers, which failed to stop the teen as he rushed at them. When the suspect did not comply with orders to stop, one of the officers fired their weapon at him, fatally wounding him, police said.
At the scene, investigators also found another man in his 30s who suffered a stabbing wound in the back. He was taken to a local hospital in serious but stable condition.
The emergency caller was reported to have been the teen, who told dispatchers he was prepared to commit a violent act at about 10 p.m. Witnesses also told police the teen had a knife.
“There are indications that he had been radicalized online,” Roger Cook, the premier of the state of Western Australia, said in the news conference. “But I want to reassure the community that it appears he acted solely alone.”
Blanch said that the attack “has the hallmarks” of a terrorist act, CNN reported, adding that it “meets the criteria or at least the definition” of this type of crime.
“We are a peace-loving nation, and there is no place for violent extremism in Australia,” Australia’s prime minister, Anthony Albanese, said in a post on X in response to Saturday’s episode.
The latest event occurred in the wake of two additional stabbing attacks across the country, violent outbursts that have not historically been common in Australia.
Six people were killed and a dozen others injured in a stabbing incident at a shopping mall in Sydney on April 13.
A 15-year-old boy was arrested a few days later in connection with the stabbing of an Assyrian Orthodox bishop and several other people during a church service. Police said that incident was not an act of terrorism.