UPI: Australia lowers terrorism threat level for first time since 2014

The country first introduced its five-level threat system in 2002 and raised it for the first time to "probable" in 2014, as a number of Australians had joined conflicts in Iraq and Syria and were supporting overseas extremist groups from home.

On Monday, Australian Security and Intelligence Organization Director-General Mike Burgess announced during a speech at the Ben Chifley Building in the capital of Canberra that they have dropped the threat level to its second-lowest tier of "possible."

Burgess said they do not make such a move lightly and it was only being taken after National Threat Assessment Center experts pored over intelligence and employed analytical techniques to test and contest their assumptions.

"Their conclusion is relatively straightforward: while Australia remains a potential terrorist target, there are fewer extremists with the intention to conduct an attack onshore than there were when we raised the threat level in 2014," he said.

"This does not mean the threat is extinguished. Far from it," he said. "'Possible' does not mean 'negligible.'"

Since 2014, there have been 11 terrorist attacks in Australia, with another 21 plots having been thwarted, Mike Burgess said, adding that there are still those who wish to do them harm - but now only fewer of them.

"Individuals are still fantasizing about killing other Australians, still spouting their hateful ideologies in chat rooms, still honing their capabilities by researching bomb-making and training with weapons," he said. "Critically, though, there are fewer of these people than there were previously, and fewer of them are likely to conduct an actual attack in Australia."

He said the attraction of groups such as the Islamic State and al-Qaida have degraded in the country, with threats of espionage and foreign interference supplanting terrorism as the nation's principal security concern.

Source: UPI