Australia foils suicide bomb plot

AUSTRALIAN police said yesterday they had arrested four people after foiling a Somali-linked suicide plot to storm a military base in what would have been the country’s worst extremist attack.

About 400 police swooped on homes around Melbourne, netting four Australian men of Somali and Lebanese descent who were allegedly planning to attack a Sydney army barracks with automatic weapons.

“The alleged offenders were prepared to inflict a sustained attack on military personnel until they themselves were killed,” said Tony Negus, acting chief commissioner of the Australian Federal Police.