Transcript of Doorstop Interview by Mr K Shanmugam, Minister for Home Affairs and Minister for Law, on the Issuance of a Restriction Order to a 15-Year-Old and the Detention of a 17-Year-Old Under the Internal Security Act

Question: Minister, how concerning are the latest cases? Can you comment a bit about the trends of these youths getting younger and younger?

Minister: Very concerning. In the past two months, two more self-radicalised young people, under 21, have been dealt with under the Internal Security Act (ISA). The first is a 15-year-old student, female. She was issued with a Restriction Order in February. She is in fact the first female under 21 who has been dealt with under the ISA.  She became a supporter of ISIS you know, just a few weeks after she was exposed to their materials online. She went to pledge allegiance to an ISIS chatbot. She did that virtually. She wanted to marry an ISIS fighter in Syria, raise a pro-ISIS family. She engaged in relationships online with foreign ISIS supporters.  She was also planning, making serious plans to go to Syria. She wanted to fight and die for ISIS.  She looked up flights to go to Syria. She thought of how she was going to save money to plan for her travels. So, looking at it, ISD decided you know the way she was supporting ISIS, the willingness to go and fight and die, engage in violence -there were security concerns, and so an RO was issued. We'll have to monitor the case very carefully.

Then there was a second case, a 17-year-old boy. He was detained in March. First case, the young lady was a Restriction Order. This young man, we have detained him. He is the fourth young person under 21 and he was detained now for far-right extremism. He was in contact with Nick Lee, some of you may recall, the 18-year-old far-right extremist - we detained him in December last year. This young man, Nick Lee’s contact, he believed that Malays and Muslims had to be killed to control their population growth. He really was an East Asian Supremacist - East Asian people higher, got to keep the Muslims and Malays down. Like the other three far-right young boys, this young man also looked up to Brenton Tarrant as his idol. Brenton Tarrant, as you know, was a man who killed lots of Muslims in a mosque in Christchurch. In fact, this young man whom we detained modelled himself after the Christchurch mosque shootings and identified five mosques as targets. Of these five, he focused on Masjid Maarof, where I am today here, speaking with you from the mosque. This boy wanted to kill at least 100 Muslims, so that he can kill more Muslims than Tarrant had killed. He also wanted to live-stream his attacks. When he was arrested, when ISD moved in, he had already made a number of attempts to get a gun. He went online to try and purchase guns. He also considered going to Malaysia and Thailand to buy guns. He told ISD quite openly if he had gotten a gun, he would have carried out his attacks.

So, concerning, because in both these cases, they were already showing signs of radicalisation. They were searching for materials online and consuming very radical materials. They were sharing their extremist views with their family members and friends. So, really, we have to ask friends, families of people, to alert us - when you see someone consuming material which is radical, going online, talking to you in very radical terms - it is good to tell Ministry of Home Affairs. We will investigate. We can guide them. Really, we are here to help them in many ways. It stops them from harming themselves and others. They receive help. We are actually able to rehabilitate them in many cases, and then they can go back to their previous lives. I will give you the example of the Indian boy who was a Christian, a Protestant. He was in fact the first far-right extremist arrested. He wanted to go to a mosque and kill Muslims as well. He was doing badly in school. After he was detained, he was counselled. Christian pastor talked to him regularly, shared what Christianity was really about. ISD helped him to study, and he passed his O Levels two years ago. He can look forward to a life rehabilitated as opposed to, you know, getting himself killed in some venture.

Question: Minister, should the Malay Muslim community be at all worried, given that there is an actual threat to the mosque in Singapore?

Minister: There have been a number of threats to mosques in Singapore. As I said, we have arrested four far-right extremists with those tendencies. We have also arrested a number who wanted to go off to Syria, Iraq and fight there. I think we all need to be worried because, you know, if Muslims get attacked, it's bad for the Muslim community, but it's bad for Singapore -because we are one community. Most of us thankfully don't see each other – “Oh, that's a Muslim community getting killed.” or “That's a Christian getting killed.” Because you know, those who are looking up ISIS and wanted to support ISIS decided that they can't go there, they will kill some Jews or Christians in Singapore. All of this is bad. I think most people would agree. We all need to be alert. We all need to be thankful that ISD has intervened so far, every single time successfully. But as I keep saying, we have to be get it right every time. Those who are either on the far-right or with tendencies towards extremism on the Islamic side, have to only need get it right once and they will kill some people. So, we need to be very careful.

Question: Minister, could you comment on the scale of influence of Nick Lee on the 17-year-old and 15 year-old considering that they interacted with other youths, Could there be other radicalised youths out there? Also, your comments to Singaporeans having to worry about their day to day lives considering that more and more are being caught.

Minister: Well, I've said the trend is concerning. Several arrested for Islamic radicalism, several arrested for far-right extremism. They are consuming the internet. They are young people. They get caught up with this, and what does it take to go out and do an attack? This young man wanted guns, but actually, you can just get a knife, and as some of them wanted to do, then go out. You may not be able to kill a hundred, but if you will be able to kill one, two. You get into a kindergarten or something, you can kill a few more. And if instead of one person, if it’s two or three, they can do more damage. And you know, it's not easy in the security forces or the ISD to be keeping track of everything. So I think it is concerning. I would say we are thankfully not in the same situation as many other places where these bad things have already happened. Thanks to the framework of laws we have in the Internal Security Act and the way we take a zero tolerance approach. For us, we don't wait until you actually are about to do something - you are thinking of, doing something you are planning, we think that you have reached the stage of, you know, getting serious about what you want to do, we move in. We have a variety of orders, restriction orders – so you are not detained, detention orders where it is more serious and you need to be taken in.

It is concerning. You know, what do I say? Can I say there are no others? I cannot tell you that. In all likelihood, there probably are others, even as we speak they may be consuming online materials, they might be planning, they might be doing things. ISD tries its best to keep track of people with these sorts of thoughts. But the large, very significant way, Singapore is largely a peaceful place between races, between religions. Harmony, we emphasise that. We are integrated in the way we live, in the way we go to schools, in the way we work. We have to make sure that we keep it going. The beautiful thing about Singapore is that you can go about your lives peacefully. That is the essence of your question. So, we have to try and preserve that way of life.

Question: The families are actually in the know, but they did not do anything or rather they did not report them to the authorities. So what is the difficulty in families trying to intervene in this kind of action?

Minister:  It is a question of judgement. I mean, the families may not realise how far advanced is the radicalisation. They may say oh, you know, this young man is saying these things. We will just talk to him. He will get out of it. So, this is part of public education. We have to educate people that, look, you actually help your children, young people, by reporting, and we will, if they are reported early enough, we can help them earlier. They won't be so radicalised. If you leave it be, bad things can happen to their children. They might go out and kill somebody or be killed. So, we'll have to continue with public education on this.

Question: Will you have any comments on the back and forth between Mr Calvin Cheng and Mr Jufrie Mohamed?

Minister: I haven’t been following it very closely. Mr Calvin Cheng comments on a variety of matters - I don’t see all of them. Those that i come across: I can say some i agree with, and some I clearly disagree with.

His views on Palestine and Israel, I can say are quite different from mine. I have a very sharply different view on Israel/Palestine from Mr Calvin Cheng. Specific to this post that I think you’re referring to, there is a police report, and from what I hear, Mr Cheng has said that he is going to start legal action. So I have to avoid commenting in detail.

Mr Jufrie says that Mr Cheng is an Islamaphobe. Mr Cheng disagrees and says that Mr Jufrie has falsely accused Mr Cheng of making a statement that was actually made by someone else. What the facts really are: I don’t know. As I said, I haven’t seen the blow by blow responses. But I would suggest it is best to keep to the truth, and also be sensitive in making comments on the Israel/Palestine situation. I will leave aside whether Mr Jufrie has put out falsehoods - and if he has, then that can be serious. As I have said earlier: I have very different views from Mr Cheng on Israel/Palestine.

I have previously said in Nov 2023 that Israel's actions are illegal and oppressive to Palestinians, and that remains my view.

On the specifics of Mr Cheng and Jufrie's posts, I have said all that I can say, as there is a police report and potential legal action.

Question: Is MHA investigating Mr Jufrie, because a police report was made.

Minister: I don’t want to go beyond what I have said. When police reports are made, there is a normal process and the Police will follow the normal process.