Two held in Sydney terror operation

Two men were arrested as part of a counterterrorism investigation into a group that officials have accused of plotting to kill a random member of the public in Sydney.

The arrests came a day after Australia's prime minister warned of heightened terrorist chatter in the aftermath of a deadly siege in a Sydney cafe, telegraph.co.uk reports.

Sulayman Khalid, 20, was charged with possession of documents designed to facilitate a terrorist attack, while a 21-year-old was charged with breaching a control order, police said.

Australian Federal Police Deputy Commissioner Michael Phelan said there was no specific terrorist threat and the arrests were related to an ongoing operation that led to a series of raids in Sydney in September.

One man was charged at that time with conspiring with an Islamic State (IS) leader in Syria to behead a random person in Sydney.

The new arrests bring to 11 the number of people charged in connection with that operation.

"There is nothing that indicates at all that (there were) any specific targets or time frame in relation to this particular activity at all," Mr Phelan said, though he added that the documents seized by police did talk about potential government targets.

The latest arrests come a day after Australian PM Tony Abbott warned there had been a "heightened level of terror chatter" in the week since a gunman took 18 people hostage in a city centre Sydney cafe.

The stand-off ended 16 hours later when police stormed the cafe in a barrage of gunfire to free the captives. Two hostages were killed, along with the gunman, an Iranian-born, self-styled cleric.

Australia's government raised the country's terror warning level in September in response to the domestic threat posed by supporters of IS.

The Sydney group that police have been investigating in relation to the alleged terror plot revealed in September involves about 15 to 20 people, and their ideology is linked to IS, Mr Phelan said.

Police investigating the group issued additional search warrants last Thursday and seized a large number of documents and three guns from a home, New South Wales Deputy Police Commissioner Catherine Burn said.