Today the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) announced the arrest of two Canadian-born citizens, John Stuart Nuttall and Amanda Marie Korody, in a terror plot targeting a public gathering at the British Columbia Legislature in Victoria on Canada Day, July 1.
According to online court records, Nuttall and Korody appeared at the Surrey Provincial Court this morning. The two suspects face charges that include “conspiring to place an explosive in or against a place of public use, a government or public facility, with the intent to cause death or serious bodily injury, for the benefit of, at the direction or in association with a terrorist group,” according to an RCMP press release.
According to Canadian officials, the investigation into Nuttall and Korody began in February 2013 following a tip from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). Assistant Commissioner James Malizia said in a prepared statement that although Nuttall and Korody were “inspired by Al Qaeda ideology,” it was “a domestic threat, without international linkages.” Additionally, officials said that there was no evidence that Nuttall and Korody had support from or were acting at the direction of a specific terrorist group.
Both Nuttal and Korody had engaged in “self-radicaliz[ing] behavior,” according to authorities. In addition, the two “discussed a wide variety of targets and techniques” prior to their arrest. Assistant Commissioner Wayne Rideout said Nuttall and Korody’s “self-radicalized behaviour was intended to create maximum impact and harm to Canadian citizens at the BC Legislature on a National holiday. They took steps to educate themselves and produced explosive devices designed to cause injury and death.”
During today’s press conference, authorities showed photos of three pressure cookers, which Nuttal and Korody intended to use as improvised explosive devices. Photos released by the RCMP show that the pressure cookers had a variety of contents, including nuts, bolts, rusty nails, and washers.
Authorities stressed that the devices were “inert” and that they “were completely under our control.” The devices, authorities said, were “secured and seized” outside the BC Legislature.
When questioned during the press conference, RCMP officials said there is currently no evidence to suggest that the plot is linked to the Boston Marathon bombings, which also involved pressure cooker devices.
Today’s announcement comes just over two months after authorities in Canada announced the arrests of Chiheb Esseghaier and Raed Jasser. The two, according to Canadian officials, had plotted to destroy a passenger train as it traveled between the United States and Canada. Esseghaier and Jasser had received “support from al Qaeda elements located in Iran” in the form of “direction and guidance,” said RCMP Assistant Commissioner James Malizia. And May 9, US authorities announced the arrest of Tunisian national Ahmed Abassi for links to the train terror plot.
2 Comments
[Assistant Commissioner James Malizia said in a prepared statement that although Nuttall and Korody were “inspired by Al Qaeda ideology,” it was “a domestic threat, without international linkages.”]
This type of bass ackward logic never seemed to ‘cloud our vision/judgement’ when confronting Communism. This also reminds me of when Cermak was assassinated when shaking hands with FDR by Guiseppe Zangara an Italian immigrant with the shadow of Emma Goldman lurking in the background.
Each era, aeon, ‘age,’ etc., in History usually comes with a limited set of ‘labels(events)’ that define that particular block of time. Political Correctness will certainly be one of those ‘labels’ applied to this ‘era’ when those in the Future look back to ‘our era’ & try to understand what motivated and or shaped/’contoured’ ‘our’ actions & decisions.
Like Boston, this is a hard one for liberals and progressives (indeed any civilized person) to swallow because it is so depressing to imagine “locals” inflicting such carnage on their own societies. It took awhile in the case of the Tsanaevs but the foreign links are certainly emerging and AQ is making great propaganda hay from the Boston after affects. How in God’s name can smart Canadians not see this was an AQ-inspired plot?? The RCMP were alerted to the suspects by CSIS! That a respected former intel officer like Michel Juneau-Katsuya completely misses the plot by stating publicly that AQ doesn’t use women (Aifia Siddiqui anyone?) and encourages people to adopt Muslim names post-conversion (David Headley did exactly the opposite to increase his operational effectiveness) does not make me very confident in the Canadian intelligence community’s grasp of the threat. Let’s not forget that Abassi, one of the two Iran-linked AQ Canadian Via bombers, also wanted to attack a water supply with bacteria to kill up to 100,000. These two are not only misguided losers, they are expendable pawns in the unfolding AQ strategy of grass roots jihad fueled by increasingly effective propaganda and online bomb-making instructions.