News Digest

Australia’s most-wanted IS recruiter killed in US airstrike in Iraq

The man described as the most dangerous Australian involved with Islamic State has been killed, according to Australian officials. Neil Prakash died in a US airstrike in Iraq, Australia’s Attorney General George Brandis revealed. Prakash, the country’s most wanted terror suspect connected with IS, was linked to several attacks on home soil. He died in Mosul on 29 April as a result of Australian intelligence, the authorities said. "Neil Prakash was a prominent ISIL member and a senior terrorist recruiter and attack facilitator,“ Mr Brandis said in a joint statement with Defence Minister Marise Payne.

Prakash has been linked to several Australia-based attack plans and calls for lone-wolf attacks against the United States. He is considered to be Australia’s most prominent ISIL recruiter.

Australia’s Attorney General George Brandis

Prakash, who left Australia in 2013, was also known as Abu Khaled al Cambodi. The 24-year-old former rapper from Melbourne was of Cambodian and Fijian descent and converted from Buddhism in 2012. He was linked to several militant attack plans in Australia, had featured in IS recruitment videos and urged lone wolf attacks against the US. "His death disrupts and degrades ISIL’s ability to recruit vulnerable people in our community to conduct terrorist acts,” said the Attorney General, adding that up to 59 Australians had so far been killed fighting for jihadists in Iraq or Syria. Australian Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said: “This is a good outcome for the safety and security of our country.”

He’s an evil person. He was involved in the deaths of people. He was wanting to inspire hatred in our country. He wanted young people to be following in the footsteps of martyrs elsewhere, committing terrorist acts here, and our country’s a safer place for him having left it.

Australian Immigration Minister Peter Dutton