KUALA LUMPUR, May 20 — Islamic State (IS) sympathisers are plotting the kidnap of high-profile figures including foreigners and bank robberies to fund their activities, according to the police today.
Among areas that are said to be targeted by the militants are business centres with a high number of expatriates as well as government offices in Putrajaya.
The police further warned that the groups are said to be planning raids on police and military armouries in order to secure the weapons needed for their plots, reminiscent of the al-Maunah militants in 2000.
“A study showed that the IS struggle has passed the first level of recruitment and training of new members, and is now entering the second level (kidnapping and robbery),” Kuala Lumpur police chief Datuk Tajuddin Md Isa was quoted as saying by national news agency Bernama.
“Monitoring by the government showed that the Malaysians who were drawn to go to Syria and Iraq had been influenced by the IS claim that the war in Syria and Iraq was an apocalyptic war,” he said, adding that police were raising security in the vulnerable areas.
Six people have already been charged over such attack plots in April, and dozens more detained over suspicions of involvement in the militant activities.
In February, Home Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had warned that IS members in Malaysia had planned to kidnap tycoons and rob banks to finance terrorist activities.
The spread of IS support among Malaysians has also forced Putrajaya to backpedal from its once-expressed admiration for the militant group’s “courage” to condemning it and enacting powerful security laws in a bid to prevent its spread.
Local authorities now make regular arrests of IS supporters allegedly plotting attacks on home soil.
In 2000, the al-Maunah militant group infiltrated an army camp and escaped with weapons from its armoury. The group was later found near Sauk, Perak leading to a deadly siege by police and military forces.
