By The Daily Journalist.
A lawyer and the store manager are the two hostages who were killed Monday in the kidnapping in a cafe located in the financial center of Sydney, which ended with the intervention of the police and also left six injured, local media reported today.
Katrina Dawson an Australian lady, 38, exercised legal work in Sydney. She was the mother of three children, and his compatriot Tori Johnson, 34, worked as a property manager, who also was assaulted, according to local ABC.
Channel 9 local television reported that Johnson allegedly attempted to disarm the hijacker, identified as Man Haron Monis or Sheikh Haron, when he started shooting, prompting police intervention. Police have not given details of what happened inside the local Lindt Chocolate Cafe, located in the finance area ‘Martin Place.’
The injured are five women, three of them with gunshot wounds, and a police officer is treated at the nearby hospital. They all remain in stable condition, police confirmed in a statement.
The call came from Sheikh Haron Monday morning over coffee, and kidnapped 17 people who were inside, between staff and customers.
Among the hostages Brazilian entrepreneur Marcia Mikhael, who during the kidnapping wrote on his Facebook page that the kidnapper “is now threatening to kill us. We need help now. The man wants the world to know that Australia is under attack by the Islamic State. “The police intervened elapsed nearly 17 hours of kidnapping.
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott and President of New South Wales, Mark Baird, ordered to hoist the national flag half mast on public buildings as a sign of respect and mourning the two “innocent victims”. The Martin Place pedestrian street is filled with wreaths, one of them a bouquet of roses deposited by the citizen Allen Jing, 25, who in tears said she was a regular customer of the assaulted shop. “It’s hard to explain how you feel about something like this, I think I’m just happy to be alive,” Jing told local ABC.
The authorities investigating the facts, keep the area closed surrounding the financial heart of Sydney’s Martin Place pedestrian street, near the Australian Reserve Bank; while the US consulate in the city announced yesterday that no one would serve the public given the tragic events. “There are lessons to be learned and decide after harsh realization of this sad incident which we must learn,” said Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, at a press conference in Canberra.
Abbott said the attacker had “a long history of violence, extremism obsession and mental instability”. The hijacker was an Iranian radical who came to Australia in 1996 and was granted political asylum. He changed his name, Manteghi Bourjerdi, by Man Haron Monis and adopted the title of Sheikh Haron. In recent years he starred in numerous protests against Australia’s military intervention in Afghanistan, in addition to outstanding accounts with the law for violence and sexual assault, among other charges.
Australian police defended its armed intervention in the kidnapping. “If there were (the police) is entered would be more dead. They have saved lives,” said Andrew Scipione, Police Commissioner of New South Wales. “They had no choice,” said Police Commissioner, while authorities have opened an independent investigation to clarify happened that could last “weeks”.
