Sydney gunman 'had history of instability'

Describing the incident as "shocking," Abbott said the gunman responsible had been infatuated with Islamist extremism and was known to security services both inside and outside Australia.

"The perpetrator was well known to both state and commonwealth authorities," Abbott told reporters in Canberra on Tuesday morning. "He had a long history of violent crime, infatuation with extremism and mental instability."

Police officers stormed the central Sydney Lindt chocolate cafe after six hostages ran from the premises in Martin Place at about 2.10 a.m. local time Tuesday (1510 UTC Monday). Officers rushed the building - tossing stun grenades - immediately after shots were heard.

The siege had begun at about 9.45 a.m. the previous day, with footage showing the man inside the coffee shop with a beard and sporting a bandana carrying writing in Arabic. He appeared to be holding a sawn-off shotgun. Hostages were made to stand at windows, with an Islamic flag at one point held being against the glass.

Praise for the police

Two hostages - a man and woman, both in their 30s - as well as Monis were killed and four others injured in the raid, with 17 people freed. The Australian Prime Minister praised the actions of police and security services.

"Australians should be reassured by the way our law enforcement and security agencies responded to this brush with terrorism," Abbott said, reflecting sorrowfully on the shock that the 16-hour siege had caused.

"There is nothing more Australian than dropping in at the local cafe for a morning coffee, and it's tragic beyond words that people going about their everyday business should have been caught up in such a horrific incident," Abbott said.

Plea for tolerance

Abbott repeated his earlier plea for Australians not to allow the attacks to cause ethnic and religious division.

"These events do demonstrate that even a country as free, as open, as generous and as safe as ours is vulnerable to acts of politically motivated violence," Abbott said.

Although Monis appeared to have been keen to link himself with the wider Islamist world, including the "Islamic State" militant group, there were little to suggest any firm connections.

Sent letters to greiving families

Monis, who was granted political asylum in Australia in 1996, was found guilty in 2012 of sending offensive and threatening letters to families of eight Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan.

New South Wales police commissioner Andrew Scipione said a decision to end the standoff had been taken because they were convinced "there would have been more deaths."

"Until we were involved in this emergency action, we believe that no one had been injured. That changed. We changed our tactic," he said.

rc/lw (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)