The Full Story Behind How The Sydney Siege Unfolded

Two people died, along with an Islamist gunman, after commandos stormed a cafe in Sydney, Australia, to bring to an end a 16-hour siege.

Local media have named those who died as Lindt cafe manager Tori Johnson, 34 and lawyer Katrina Dawson, 38.

Four people were injured, including a policeman hit by shotgun pellets.

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Katrina Dawson, 38, a successful barrister and mother of young children, and Tori Johnson, the 34-year-old manager of the Lindt cafe, were killed as police made a daring attempt to free those still held at the Martin Place shop.

Mr Johnson has been hailed as a hero after it emerged he had taken the opportunity to wrestle the gun from the 50-year-old self-styled Iranian preacher after he began to doze off in the early hours.

Ms Dawson, a respected barrister from Eighth Floor Selborne chambers, whose offices are opposite the cafe, was said to have be killed in the ensuing firefight while protecting pregnant friend and colleague Julie Taylor, whom she had been meeting for a coffee.

The first flowers were laid in Martin Place around sunrise on Tuesday, just hours after the siege.

The memorial of flowers has grown throughout the day with local florists struggling to keep up with demand. The NSW Premier and Australia’s Governor General were among those who visited the site to pay their respects.

news.com.au

NSW Premier Mike Baird has announced flags on all NSW Government buildings will fly at half-mast today. The flags on the Sydney Harbour Bridge are also at half-mast.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott says the flag also be flown at half-mast today at all Commonwealth Government buildings as a mark of respect and mourning for all the innocent victims involved in the siege.

news.com.au

Mr Abbott said it would take time to clarify exactly what happened and that he would travel to Sydney this afternoon for official briefings. He said the man behind the siege, Man Haron Monis, was well known to authorities with a "long history of violent crime, infatuation with extremism and mental instability".

"As the siege unfolded yesterday, he sought to cloak his actions with the symbolism of the ISIL death cult. Tragically, there are people in our community ready to engage in politically motivated violence," he added.

But Mr Abbott said he wanted to offer words of comfort and reassurance to Australians.

"Australians should be reassured by the way our law enforcement and security agencies responded to this brush with terrorism," he said. "There is nothing more Australian than dropping in at the local cafe for a morning coffee and it's tragic beyond words that people going about their everyday business should have been caught up in such a horrific incident."

"Our hearts go out to all of those caught up in this appalling incident and their loved ones. On behalf of all Australians, I extend my sympathy to the families of the two hostages who died over night," Mr Abbott said.

Martin Place, scene of the Lindt cafe siege, will shortly be getting a prime ministerial visit. Tony Abbott departed Canberra at around 2pm to lay a floral tribute to add to the swathe of garlands that have amassed in Martin Place in memory of the two hostages who lost their lives.

Abbott is then expected to tour the police operations centre to thank police involved in the siege and to receive further briefings from Mike Baird, the NSW premier, and Andrew Scipione, the NSW police commissioner.

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Police have not commented on casualties in the raid, but Australian media reported that some people may have died and others may have been injured. Police have not disclosed the fate of the gunman, identified by an official with direct knowledge of the situation as Man Haron Monis. It was unknown if any police were injured.

Before some of the hostages had fled, Seven Network reported that at least 13 people were being held at the cafe, but police declined to say how many were in there. New South Wales Police Deputy Commissioner Catherine Burn said it was fewer than 30.

Reports says NSW police have confirmed that live ammunition was used – we assume by police officers. It is at the moment unclear whether any shots were fired by the hostage-taker. Journalists on the scene report multiple instances of gunfire.

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News Corp and other news organisations have named the suspected gunman after being informed by the police that there are no longer any operational reasons not to report his name, so we can reveal that he is Man Haron Monis, also known as Sheikh Haron.

Man Haron Monis is a 49-year-old self-styled “Muslim cleric and peace activist”, Michael Safi of The Guardian reports. Iranian-born Monis told ABC News in 2001 that he fled to Australia five years earlier after falling foul of the Iranian regime, which had placed his wife and children under house arrest. “I can say they are hostage,” he said at the time.

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No stranger to the NSW police or the judiciary, the self-described cleric first came to attention of police when he penned poisonous letters to the family of dead Australian soldiers seven years ago. Last year he was charged with being an accessory to the murder of his ex-wife and mother of two.

Most recently, he was charged with more than 50 allegations of indecent and sexual assault relating to time allegedly spent as a self-proclaimed "spiritual healer" who dealt with black magic at a premises in western Sydney more than a decade ago.

theage.com.au

In press conference earlier today, Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione revealed that police have identified the gunman but have asked media outlets not to publish his name due to operational reasons. At this stage there is only one confirmed gunman.

In regards to the hostages who have escaped from the cafe earlier, it is still not clear if the hostages escaped or were freed and police are not confirming either ways for operational reasons.

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With many of the key facts around this incident still unknown or unconfirmed, the NSW police and Australia’s Muslim community are calling for calm.

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After concerns that people wearing Islamic dress could be harassed, Sydney locals have been using Twitter to offer to travel with them and spreading the message of tolerance.

Locals have became concerned about the potential for rising intolerance or aggression towards people wearing religious dress.

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Malaysian students in Sydney have been warned to stay away from central Sydney following the siege of the Lindt Chocolat Cafe by a gunman.

"Please avoid the area around Martin Place until further notice," reads the emergency message on the Education Malaysia Australia website.

Meanwhile, the Malaysian Students' Council of Australia (MASCA) also issued an emergency announcement on its Facebook page Monday morning.

Twenty hostages have been taken by gunmen – apparently Islamic extremists - at a popular café in Martin Place, the heart of Sydney.

The siege began at the Lindt chocolate shop café at about 9.45am, local time, and has brought the city to a standstill.

The man is allegedly referring to himself as “the brother” and claims to have four devices planted around Sydney, including two inside the Lindt cafe.

thenewdaily.com.au

Channel 10 is the third media outlet saying they have been contacted by hostages in the Lindt cafe. Police have specifically requested media outlets not reveal the content of the conversations. The other two outlets are 2GB radio and News Corp Australia.

theguardian.com

The hostage taker is “claiming political motivation”, PM Tony Abbott said in a statement after chairing a meeting of the National Security Committee of the Cabinet which was briefed by the NSW Premier, Mike Baird, and the NSW police commissioner, Andrew Scipione.

"This is a very disturbing incident. It is profoundly shocking that innocent people should be held hostage by an armed person claiming political motivation."

Abbott says different governments, agencies and police have been working together all day and he commends the people of Sydney on their calmness.

"Obviously, images have been beamed around our country and around the world. I’ve received messages of support from a number of international leaders and I thank them for their encouragement on this difficult day. Yes, it has been a difficult day. Yes, it is a day which has tested us, but so far, like Australians in all sorts of situations, we have risen to the challenge."

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NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione said they were operating in accordance with counter terrorism protocols and encouraged people to stay away from CBD.

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One man dressed in what appeared to be a Lindt uniform was seen running out of a fire door to waiting police around 3.40pm on Monday. Another two people also exited the building shortly after.

About an hour later, two more hostages escaped – both women. The women appeared to be wearing Lindt uniforms.

thenewdaily.com.au

NSW Police Deputy Commissioner Catherine Burn said police investigators "are trying to work out the offender's motivations". She also said police do not believe anyone in the cafe has been hurt.

Deputy Commissioner Catherine Burn also confirmed that police are in contact with a gunman inside the cafe.

"Police negotiators have had contact and they continue to have contact and we will work through this as we do, with our negotiators," she says in a press conference.

bbc.co.uk

The incident began as people were arriving for work in Martin Place on Monday morning.

Witnesses saw a man with a bag and gun walk into the Lindt chocolate shop and cafe. The man was reported to be wearing a headband with Arabic words written on it.

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There are claims that the terrorist is also armed with a machete and may have explosives but this has not been confirmed by police.

The flag appears to bear the Shahada, an Islamic creed which reads: “There is no god but God, Muhammad is the messenger of God.” It can be a benign symbol and appears across the Islamic world, including on the Saudi Arabian flag. But it has also been embraced by jihadi groups such as Jabhat Al-Nusra, an al-Qaida affiliate currently fighting in Syria.

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Director of the Global Terrorism Research Centre, Professor Greg Barton, said the black flag was clearly meant to signify a link with a terror group, possibly the Islamic State.

"It's likely a link with its groups, and what's happening in Syria, rather than a statement of faith," he told 702 ABC Sydney. "But it could also be a single lone wolf attacker."

Dozens of police including a SWAT team are there and a couple of hundred people are being held back by cordons.

Trains and buses have been stopped and roads are blocked in the area. Train operators are saying there has been a bomb threat at Martin Place.

“There’s no trains operating on the T4 eastern suburbs and Illawarra line. No trains on that line between central and Bondi junction,” a NSW transport spokesperson told The New Daily.

Earlier, there were unconfirmed reports the Civil Aviation Safety Authority had shut down the air space above central Sydney, however Minister for Infrastructure Warren Truss denied the reports.

A Qantas spokesperson told The New Daily: “There’s a no fly zone just over the CBD to make room for police helicopters. Commercial flights are being diverted”.

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Several other locations have been closed or evacuated, including the NSW parliamentary executive offices, Chifley Square, the State Library and the NSW Supreme Court’s criminal courts and several city legal chambers.

Office workers up to one kilometre from the site are reporting that they cannot leave their buildings.

thenewdaily.com.au

Soon after the hostage crisis broke out, the Sydney Opera House was evacuated after a suspicious package was found. It was not clear if the two incidents were related.

In a Facebook post later in the afternoon, the Opera House said that all performances for Monday night had been cancelled.

straitstimes.com

Just moments before the hostage situation at Martin Place began, police announced the arrest of two Sydney men as part of a major counter-terrorism investigation.

The Australian Federal Police apprehended a 25-year-old terror suspect in Beecroft in Sydney's leafy north-western suburbs this morning, reportedly as he was leaving a prayer hall.

A NSW police spokeswoman said there was 'nothing to indicate [a link between the two incidents] at this stage'.

After weeks of poor publicity around the world, its surge pricing policy now seems to have kicked in in the middle of a security crisis. Mashable is reporting that it is charging a mimimum of $100 to users in downtown Sydney.

Uber were criticised for charging minimum $100 for people trying to leave the CBD during the siege. They have since offered free rides.

theguardian.com