Home­land Se­cu­ri­ty Min­is­ter Roger Alexan­der has laud­ed the ac­tions of po­lice of­fi­cers in res­cu­ing kid­napped CAL pi­lot Daniel Kawall, as he warned crim­i­nals that of­fi­cers would de­fend them­selves with lethal force if nec­es­sary.

On Sun­day, Kawall who spent two days in cap­tiv­i­ty was res­cued from a forest­ed area in Mar­aval.

Po­lice killed a sus­pect­ed dur­ing a con­fronta­tion in the area.

Com­ment­ing on the res­cue af­ter at­tend­ing a brief in­ter-faith cer­e­mo­ny at the St Au­gus­tine Sec­ondary School on Mon­day, Alexan­der com­mend­ed Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Al­lis­ter Gue­var­ro for his proac­tive ap­proach in tack­ling se­ri­ous crime.

He main­tained that po­lice of­fi­cers, once fired at were well with­in their rights to de­fend them­selves and oth­ers.

"If you choose that life, re­mem­ber there are con­se­quences.

"If you de­cide to take some­one's famiy and put them in a house, a cage or un­der the ground as they nor­mal­ly put per­sons and the po­lice con­fronts you and you tell your­self you want that mon­ey by any means nec­es­sary, then there must be slow singing and flow­ers bring­ing for you.

"I can­not see it go­ing any oth­er way."

Alexan­der al­so chid­ed the par­ents of crim­i­nals who de­fend­ed or hid their law­less be­hav­iour, not­ing that they had no right to ac­cuse the po­lice of us­ing ex­ces­sive force, es­pe­cial­ly when they shot at of­fi­cers.

"Some of their par­ents might say, 'Don't kill him, while you're shoot­ing try and rea­son with him or talk to him,' well you come and tell him or her that while there is a gun­fight go­ing on and see how that works."

Alexan­der was al­so crit­i­cal of peo­ple on so­cial me­dia who scru­ti­nised the re­sponse of po­lice of­fi­cers in high-risk sce­nar­ios, not­ing that they did not have the ex­pe­ri­ence or skills to pass judg­ment in po­ten­tial life and death sit­u­a­tions.