The federal government's response to the attempted bombing at the Boorloo January 26 rally has been defended by the Minister for Indigenous Australians.
A 31-year-old man, who cannot be named for legal reasons, remains in police custody after allegedly throwing an explosive device containing nails and ball bearings into a crowd of 2,500 people during the Invasion Day rally on Monday before attempting to flee.
The device did not detonate.
Speaking on ABC News on Thursday, Senator Malarndirri McCarthy defended the government's response. When asked whether not immediately declaring the incident a terrorist act amounted to ignoring the fears of the Indigenous community and allies, she said the event was "really serious" and that the government was treating it accordingly.
"There is a legal process underway and it is important that that legal process takes place," Senator McCarthy said.
"The prime minister's first words, when he heard on Tuesday that charges had been laid, were that the charges were serious and that the book should be thrown at this."
Speaking in Darwin on Tuesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said of the man allegedly involved in the attack, "they should throw the book at him".
"This was an incident that is quite shocking and he's been charged with two serious offences and I look forward to him being prosecuted to the full force of the law," he said.
After police charged the man with one count of "Unlawful act or omission with intent to harm (endangering life, health or safety of any person)" and one count of "Making or possession of explosives under suspicious circumstances," WA Police, the Australian Federal Police, and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) issued a statement on Wednesday evening confirming the attack is being investigated as a potential terrorist act.
Senator McCarthy said she was "pleased to see" the investigation was now focused on terror offences.
The Minister said she had spoken with the WA government, the WA Indigenous affairs minister, and families who attended the rally, and expected a full briefing before the return of federal parliament next week.
On Wednesday, Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe urged the federal government to respond as decisively to rising threats against First Peoples as it did to the antisemitic attack at Bondi.
"What happened in Perth was not a minor incident. An explosive device was thrown into a crowd of First Peoples and supporters on our Day of Mourning. It was intended to detonate but thankfully failed," she said.
"This was a serious act of violence that could very easily have become a mass-casualty event, and it must be treated as such."
The independent senator said almost no information about the motivation or ideology behind the attack has been made public — noting the identity of the alleged perpetrator has been suppressed — and called for an inquiry into the incident and any perceived intelligence failures.
Asked about Senator Thorpe's comments, Senator McCarthy said, "We have to see what the investigation outcome is. I have heard from elders who met with the West Australian police commissioner. They have been briefed on what took place on the day at the rally. They were very pleased to be a part of that briefing.
"There are a lot of facts that perhaps cannot be revealed at this point in time, but I will certainly be pursuing it in Parliament next week," she added.
Also on Wednesday, National Indigenous Times reported Noongar and other First Nations leaders from a range of groups and organisations met with senior police officials, including WA Commissioner Col Blanch, to discuss Monday's events.
Megan Krakouer, director of the National Suicide Prevention and Trauma Project, said the meeting was positive but noted there remains considerable unrest and unease following the attack. She said it "gave a lot of answers for questions that had been unanswered."
"Obviously there needs to be more evidence and intelligence gathered at this point before the final outcomes... At this point it seems like it was racially motivated, but only once the evidence is gathered it can be [officially] called [a hate crime]," she said.
Stan Headland, a member of Boorloo/Perth's Cultural Advisor Committee, said Commissioner Blanch "put across well what they are going to do with the perpetrator, and explained to us how they are going to deal with this man and find out everything about him, anything he might have written down, on his computers".
"All the people out there who complain about our people and January 26, there's no need for it... If we want to go out and protest, so be it - there is no law against it," he said.
Additional reporting by Maria Marouchtchak and Giovanni Torre
