KUALA LUMPUR — Islamic State sympathisers are plotting the kidnap of high-profile figures including foreigners and bank robberies to fund their activities, Malaysian police said yesterday. 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 Islamic State 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 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 Islamic State 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 were charged yesterday over such terrorism attack plots in April, and dozens more detained over suspicions of involvement in the militant activities. The six were part of 12 who were arrested last month on suspicions of plotting attacks on strategic targets and governmental interests in Kuala Lumpur.

Along with the arrests, the police had also seized Islamic State flags and various bomb-making materials. The 12 were allegedly planning to launch an attack on the country’s administrative capital, Putrajaya, police sources said, and there were many other locations in the country on their hit list.

Other targets included buildings in Jalan Duta and Bukit Perdana where the Kuala Lumpur court complex, Bukit Aman Commercial Crimes Investigation Department and other government facilities are located.

Early last month, the country’s top counterterrorism official Ayob Khan warned that evidence gathered so far of Malaysian involvement in the Islamic State suggests that attacks by the group on Malaysian soil are imminent. In February, Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi had warned that Islamic State members in Malaysia had planned to kidnap tycoons and rob banks to finance terrorist activities.

The spread of Islamic State support among Malaysians has led Putrajaya to enact powerful security laws in a bid to prevent its spread.

To give more teeth to its fight against the radicalised militants, Malaysia passed an anti-terrorism Bill which gives the police broad powers to arrest and detain without trial individuals suspected of terrorist activities. The key provisions of the new Prevention of Terrorism Act include detaining suspected terrorists for up to two years with a possibility of a further two years’ extension; an electronic monitoring device being attached to the detainee; and the administration of various preventive measures to deradicalise suspects. Local authorities now make regular arrests of Islamic State supporters allegedly plotting attacks on home soil.

The authorities have identified over 100 Malaysians involved with the Islamic State, of whom more than 72 were reported last month to have been detained, while scores of sympathisers remain in Syria and Iraq. 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. AGENCIES