Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott exceeds himself in creating public mischief for political purposes

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has fronted television cameras at least five times since the Martin Place siege revealed itself to a shocked Australia.

On the 15  December 2014, the day the siege commenced:

http://youtu.be/_GySx8FT0TQ.

Then in a flurry on the second and final day:

Press Statement 16 December 2014 | Transcript

Flags at half-mast today 16 December 2014 | Media release

Joint Press Conference, Sydney 16 December 2014 | Transcript.

Followed by this the day after:

Martin Place siege - Joint Commonwealth -New South Wales review17 December 2014 | Media release.

Despite the fact that the motivation for the siege appeared to be unrelated to any specific jihadist group, Tony Abbott insisted on associating it with Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

In fact in one of these televised press conferences he managed to use his favourite term, death cult, four times in one short paragraph:

However, if one is a fear-mongering politician one cannot rest on one’s laurels, so on 17 December Abbott started to assert that the now deceased gunman had been given a gun licence:

Unfortunately for the prime minister this has since been refuted by at least one Fairfax journalist:

NSW Police have also refused to back his statement.

The Sydney Morning Herald 17 December 2014:

NSW police say there is no record that Martin Place siege gunman Man Haron Monis had a gun licence.

This is despite the Prime Minister Tony Abbott asserting in a press conference earlier that Monis, killed by police in a gun battle after a 16-hour siege, had been allowed to legally own weapons.

"The NSW Police Force has conducted checks with the NSW Firearms Registry and can confirm there is no record of the 50-year-old man having held a firearms licence," a statement issued this evening said.

UPDATE

On 18 December 2014 Sky News reported that:

Attorney-General George Brandis says the government has not found any link between the gunman in the Sydney siege and Islamic State….

early indications are that he wasn't actually a member or an affiliate of a terrorist organisation…