Singapore detains teenager radicalised by far-right extremism

Singapore: An 18-year-old Singapore student who was radicalised by violent far-right extremism online and who idolised the gunman behind deadly attacks on two mosques in New Zealand has been detained under the Internal Security Act, the government said.

Nick Lee Xing Qiu identified as an "East Asian supremacist" and envisioned starting a "race war" between Chinese and Malays in Singapore, the Internal Security Department (ISD) said in a statement issued on Monday.

"At the point of his arrest, Lee's attack ideations were aspirational and he had no timeline to carry them out," the ISD said, adding investigations into his online contacts had not revealed any imminent threats to Singapore.

Lee has been detained since December under the ISA, which allows suspects to be held for up to two years without trial.

The ISD said Lee found Islamophobic and far-right extremist content on social media in 2023, and then began actively searching for such content. It said he idolised the gunman who killed 51 people in two mosques in Christchurch in 2019, role-playing as him in an online simulation.

"Lee aspired to carry out attacks against Muslims in Singapore with like-minded far-right individuals that he conversed with online," the ISD said.

Lee is the third Singaporean youth with far-right extremist ideologies to be dealt with under the ISA, the department said, noting far-right extremism was a growing concern globally.

"Youths may be more susceptible to such ideologies and may gravitate toward the sense of belonging and identity that far-right movements appear to provide," the ISD said.

Separately, the Ministry of Home Affairs said it had cancelled the long-term visit pass of a 38-year-old Iranian woman, Parvane Heidaridehkordi, and revoked the permanent resident status of her Malaysian husband, after she was found to have engaged in activities that were a national security risk.

"Parvane was involved in the operations of a Singapore-registered travel agency that had sponsored visa applications by terrorism-linked foreigners to enter Singapore," the ministry said, saying investigations found the agency was a front for an operation directed from overseas.

Her husband, 65-year-old Soo Thean Ling, had tried to register a travel agency business twice after authorities commenced their investigation, with the intention that his wife would operate them, the ministry said.

The two will be deported and barred from re-entering Singapore, the ministry said.