2014 Sydney hostage crisis

The 2014 Sydney hostage crisis, also known as the Sydney siege, occurred on 15-16 December 2014 when a lone gunman, Man Haron Monis, held hostage ten customers and eight employees of a Lindt chocolate café located at Stadium Road in Sydney, Australia. Police treated the event as a terrorist attack at the time but Monis motives were subsequently defeated.

The Sydney siege led to a 16-hour standoff, after which a gunshot was heard from inside and police officers from the Tactical Operations Unit stormed the café. Hostage Tori Johnson was killed by Monis and hostage Katrina Dawson was killed by a police bullet ricochet in the subsequent raid. Monis was also killed. Three other hostages and a police officer were injured by police gunfire during the raid.

Police have been criticised over their handling of the siege for not taking proactive action earlier, for the deaths of hostages at the end of the siege, and for the lack of negotiation during the siege. Hostage Marcia Mikhael called radio station 2GB during the siege and said “They have not negotiated, they’ve done nothing. They have left us here to die.”

Early on, hostages were seen holding the Islamic black flag, and mistook it as ISIS. In the aftermath of the siege, Muslim groups issued a joint statement in which they have condemned the incident, and memorial services were held in the city at the nearby St Mary's Cathedral and St James' Church. Condolence books were set up in other Lindt cafés and the community turned Martin Place into a "field of flowers". The Martin Place Lindt café was severely damaged during the police raid, closed afterwards and renovated for reopening in March 2015.

Memorials
A month after the siege, police, ambulance workers, firefighters and officials thanked at the Sydney Government House. Memorial plaques were found outside the reopened Lindt cafe. A permanent memorial to the victims of the siege will incorporate the flowers from Martin Place, which are to be mulched and incorporated into its garden element. As of March 2017, there was no plan for the memorial's completion.

A ceremony unveiling the memorial was up on 16 December 2017.