A student has been accused of planning to throw a Molotov cocktail at an Australia Day crowd next Monday as part of an alleged terrorist plot to overthrow the Australian government.<\/p>\n
Sepehr Saryazdi, 24, allegedly planned the attack for Monday’s celebrations in Queensland to promote a new phase of civilisation powered by artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n
He is accused of targeting a Gold Coast event, allegedly posting online that he would be leading Australia Day “riots” on the popular tourist strip.<\/p>\n
Saryazdi on Thursday applied for bail in Brisbane Magistrates Court after being charged with the preparation of or planning for a terrorist act.<\/p>\n
He bought bottles of alcohol, wrapping paper and a blanket between January 4 and 9 in preparation for the attack, according to court documents obtained by AAP.<\/p>\n
Crown prosecutor Ellie McDonald opposed bail, saying he had made “extremely concerning” comments in a Facebook chat.<\/p>\n
“He states, ‘I’ll be leading the Gold Coast riots on January 26,” she said.<\/p>\n
“‘If you know people in Melbourne let them know so they can start buying vodka bottles early and stockpiling batches’.'”<\/p>\n
Saryazdi allegedly said he expected to die during the Gold Coast attack unless he was killed or lobotomised by Australia’s spy agency ASIO.<\/p>\n
He allegedly added that his actions were “purely logical given the trajectory of this nation”.<\/p>\n
“I recommend learning how to shoot guns at shooting ranges while you can,” he allegedly said on Facebook.<\/p>\n
Saryazdi allegedly told police he saw the government as “turning tyrannical” and wanted to replace it with a “cybernetics” alternative where society was guided by AI and data analysis.<\/p>\n
He allegedly had a document titled “Australia’s future cybernetics government the next phase of civilization”.<\/p>\n
Saryazdi had a Master of Mathematical Sciences from the University of Sydney, according to his online profiles.<\/p>\n
He also described himself as a PhD candidate with the CSIRO data and digital specialist arm and Australian Centre for Robotics.<\/p>\n
Saryazdi intended to make national news and bring people together with attention to his disenchantment with the government, his Legal Aid solicitor Hellen Shilton said.<\/p>\n
He had a very isolated lifestyle and lost contact with his parents since moving interstate to Brisbane, she said.<\/p>\n
“He became influenced a bit by the new people he associated with. He was watching videos of protests,” Shilton said.<\/p>\n
“He admits he became quite overwhelmed emotionally. He felt he should do something with the way the world was going … it was never his intention to hurt anyone.”<\/p>\n
At the point of allegedly purchasing the alcohol and other items, reality started to sink in and he had made silly choices about his cause, his solicitor said.<\/p>\n
“He has never taken part in any protests, he is obviously misguided,” Shilton said.<\/p>\n
Saryazdi’s argument for bail appeared at odds with his statements to police, magistrate Penelope Hay said.<\/p>\n
“Contrary to admissions he made that he intended to throw a Molotov cocktail in a public place on Australia Day and overthrow the government?” she said.<\/p>\n
Hay denied Saryazdi bail due to the apparent strength of the prosecution case and his alleged serious link to violent offending.<\/p>\n
He was remanded in custody and is due to face court again on February 20.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A student has been accused of planning to throw a Molotov cocktail at an Australia Day crowd next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[85,42,43,31451,40,38,41,39],"class_list":{"0":"post-246861","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-headlines","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-terrorism","12":"tag-top-news","13":"tag-top-stories","14":"tag-topnews","15":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}