spinofflive
A Police officer stands guard at the Countdown LynnMall after the knife attack that left seven injured. (Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)
A Police officer stands guard at the Countdown LynnMall after the knife attack that left seven injured. (Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)

The BulletinSeptember 6, 2021

The story of the Auckland terrorist

A Police officer stands guard at the Countdown LynnMall after the knife attack that left seven injured. (Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)
A Police officer stands guard at the Countdown LynnMall after the knife attack that left seven injured. (Photo by Fiona Goodall/Getty Images)

Friday’s attack at a supermarket followed years of attempts by the government to deport a refugee who had become radicalised, Justin Giovannetti writes in The Bulletin.

Officials tried for years to deport the terrorist responsible for Friday’s attack. The man responsible for stabbing shoppers at a west Auckland supermarket had been on the government’s watchlist for years, according to RNZ. After a judge lifted a suppression order over the weekend, the full story of Ahamed Aathil Mohamed Samsudeen can be told.

But first, a story of a New Zealander who helped his neighbours. Amait Nand was in the freezer section when he heard screaming. He ran over to find a man with a knife. With people on the floor bleeding, Nand ran up to the man armed only with a sign pole and tried to stop him. Stuff looked at people in New Lynn who helped on a horrible Friday.

Seven people were injured in the attack and three remain in hospital while three more are in the ICU, in critical but stable condition. One person has been released from hospital. As the prime minister said Friday: “This was an attack by an individual, not a culture, not a religion or an ethnicity, but an individual who was gripped by an ideology that is not supported by anyone here”.

The man was fighting to keep his refugee status. Samsudeen, a 32-year-old born in Sri Lanka, had been in New Zealand since 2011 when he arrived on a student visa. He made a claim for refugee status soon after, but was declined. He appealed, and was granted the status the following year. The prime minister said on Friday that his claim was based on a fraudulent document.

A turn towards radicalisation. The NZ Herald obtained the man’s refugee application and found that he was angry, worried about his parents, alone and unsupported, without confidence or maturity: “In other words, almost the perfect candidate to be radicalised in his living room.” He came to the attention of police in 2016 after posting comments supporting the Islamic State on Facebook.

His arrest. The man was under close surveillance when he was arrested in 2017 at Auckland airport, presumed to be on his way to Syria. Police found a large hunting knife and Islamic State propaganda in his Auckland apartment. He spent more than a year in jail. Without enough evidence, he was released under supervision and told his refugee status was going to be revoked.

The legal gap. The man couldn’t be charged as a terrorist because of a gap in New Zealand’s laws. Authorities knew he was planning a “lone wolf” knife attack, the NZ Herald reported as much earlier this year, but planning an act of terror is not a crime in New Zealand. Instead, he spent much of the past three years being prosecuted on different charges. Ardern said Friday it was “disappointing” that he couldn’t be held in jail while his deportation went through the appeals process.

Radicalised in New Zealand. The terrorist’s mother told a TV channel in Sri Lanka that her son had been “brainwashed” by neighbours from Syria and Iraq, according to RNZ. The government rejected her account yesterday according to The Spinoff’s live updates, with the deputy prime minister saying there was no proof of her claim. All the same, the man’s family has reprimanded his radical views and said they were heartbroken by his actions The Guardian has raised the question of whether the New Zealand government should have focused more on deradicalisation work, rather than following the man with police officers and trying to kick him out of the country.

The government will toughen anti-terror laws. Officials in the justice ministry were working over the weekend on an overhaul of the country’s terrorism law. The prime minister has now said the bill will pass by the end of the month, according to Stuff. The National party has offered to help to pass the bill first revealed in April, after nearly a decade of warnings that the country’s law was too weak, namely by not making it a crime to plan and prepare for a terrorist attack. Andrew Geddis has written in The Spinoff that a tougher law probably wouldn’t have changed much in this case and parliament shouldn’t rush through legislation.


A paid message from our partner Te Taura Whiri, the Māori Language Commission: Join us in celebrating te reo Māori at 12pm on Tuesday, September 14. Sign yourself and your workplace, whānau and flatmates up to our Māori Language Moment. Kia kaha te reo Māori, kia kaha Aotearoa!


This is part of The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s must-read daily news wrap. To sign up for free, simply enter your email address below

Auckland Hospital and Starship Childrens Hospital (Photo: Phil Walter/Getty Images)
Auckland Hospital and Starship Childrens Hospital (Photo: Phil Walter/Getty Images)

The BulletinSeptember 3, 2021

Covid-19 case numbers soar in hospitals

Auckland Hospital and Starship Childrens Hospital (Photo: Phil Walter/Getty Images)
Auckland Hospital and Starship Childrens Hospital (Photo: Phil Walter/Getty Images)

Auckland’s hospitals ask for help as they face a wave of patients from the more virulent delta variant, Justin Giovannetti writes in The Bulletin.

Delta is a different virus. There have been warnings for months that the delta variant of Covid-19 is a greater worry than the original strain of the virus. It’s highly contagious, more so than the common cold, and makes cases infectious much more quickly. Unfortunately, the variant also leads to higher rates of hospitalisation.

A fast rising line. One of the charts I’ve been watching in recent days is the growing number of hospitalisations in Auckland due to the delta outbreak. Compared to the first wave of the virus in early 2020, the numbers are soaring. There are now 42 people in hospital compared to 16 at the same point in the first wave. The figures for intensive care are slightly better, with six cases in ICU yesterday, half of whom were on ventilators. At this point in the first wave outbreak there were five cases in ICU.

“A stark reminder”. That’s how Ashley Bloomfield described the growing number of hospitalisations yesterday, according to Newsroom. People in ICU were stable, though as Bloomfield noted, “they can be stable but quite unwell”. The youngest person in the group is 18 years old. Unlike the first wave, delta has so far sent a number of much younger patients to hospital.

You’re twice as likely to become hospitalised with delta. There’s increasingly solid evidence about how virulent delta is, according to Micheal Plank. He’s a professor at the University of Canterbury and the principal investigator at Te Pūnaha Matatini, a group that has been integral to modelling Covid-19’s spread in New Zealand.

“Data from overseas has shown that delta is more severe and it carries a higher risk. There’s one study that just came out last week that estimates that delta has more than double the hospitalisation rate compared to the alpha variant,” he told The Bulletin. The BBC wrote about that study.

A helpful reminder at this point is that alpha used to be known as the UK variant. Alpha itself might be more virulent than the virus first detected in Wuhan.

There are two issues to watch with the hospitalisations. The numbers only tell part of the story. The delta outbreak has predominantly impacted the country’s Pacific community. A group that is at higher risk of needing more treatment if becoming sick. Why? “Structural factors stemming from colonisation and racism in the health system,” said Plank.

Then there’s the age of people becoming sick. Because many of the country’s older residents have been vaccinated, something which still does an excellent job of protecting people against Covid-19, delta is impacting the young. “The health burden is being shifted from older groups to younger groups. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it’s something to watch,” he said.

The impact on the healthcare system. Auckland’s hospitals put out a call for more ICU nurses from across the country on Tuesday night. One News reports Bloomfield as saying that the call was planned to help ensure there are a group of nurses dedicated to looking after Covid-19 patients. Nurses themselves have said their morale is low and there’s a very limited pool to draw from. Middlemore, Auckland City and North Shore hospitals have begun building negative pressure rooms to care for the growing number of cases, according to RNZ.

The cautionary tale is across the ditch. In New South Wales, the number of hospital patients has soared by 42% over the past week, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. There are now 917 Covid-19 patients in the state’s hospitals and surge plans have been put into place to deal with a growing wave of cases. The peak isn’t expected until next month. The state also highlights how Covid-19 can make a bad situation worse, with 1429 healthcare workers currently isolating, taking away capacity when it is most needed.

 


This is part of The Bulletin, The Spinoff's must-read daily news wrap. To sign up for free, simply enter your email address below