Ardern said the country’s gun laws will change as a result of the carnage, but she did not specify how. On Saturday, the prime minister said the “primary perpetrator” in the shootings was a licensed gun owner and legally acquired the five guns used. In 2015, it had just eight gun homicides.īefore Friday’s attack, New Zealand’s deadliest shooting in modern history took place in 1990 in the small town of Aramoana, where a gunman killed 13 people following a dispute with a neighbor. But it has one of the lowest gun homicide rates in the world. New Zealand, with a population of 5 million, has relatively loose gun laws and an estimated 1.5 million firearms, or roughly one for every three people. World leaders condemned the violence and offered condolences, with President Donald Trump tweeting, “We stand in solidarity with New Zealand.” Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan and other Islamic leaders pointed to the bloodbath and other such attacks as evidence of rising hostility toward Muslims since 9/11. ![]() In the aftermath, the country’s threat level was raised from low to high, police warned Muslims against going to a mosque anywhere in New Zealand, and the national airline canceled several flights in and out of Christchurch, a city of nearly 400,000. “We just want to know if they are dead or alive,” Mohammed told the officer. On Saturday, outside one of the two mosques, 32-year-old Ash Mohammed pushed through police barricades in hopes of finding out what happened to his father and two brothers, whose cellphones rang unanswered. Tarrant has spent little time in Australia in the past four years and only had minor traffic infractions on his record. It was then that Wahabzadah said he returned to the mosque to discover the scope of the violence.Tarrant’s relatives in the Australian town of Grafton, in New South Wales, contacted police after learning of the shooting and were helping with the investigation, local authorities said. He said he continued chasing after him but the shooter did a U-turn and raced off. “When he sees me I am chasing with a gun, he sat in his car”, Wahabzadah said. “And I just got the gun and throw it on his window like an arrow and blast his window. He thought probably I shot him or something and then he drive off." Wahabzadah told CNN he ran after the shooter and picked up a discarded weapon of the gunman, which he described as a “shotgun." He threw it at the gunman’s car, shattering his window. Wahabzadah said the shooter then dropped his weapon and ran back to his car. Wahabzadah said he thought the shooter went to get more weapons from his car. Wahabzadah’s four children were inside the mosque. “I was screaming at the guy, ‘Come here, I’m here’," Wahabzadah told CNN. "I just want him to put more focus on me than go inside the masjid (“mosque”). But unfortunately, he got himself to the masjid.” He threw the credit card reader at the suspect while shouting at him in an attempt to distract the shooter away from the mosque. ![]() ![]() Wahabzadah grabbed a credit card reader and ran outside the building. (AP/Mark Baker)Ībdul Aziz Wahabzadah says he was inside Linwood Islamic Centre in Christchurch, New Zealand, when a gunman opened fire. Multiple people were killed during shootings at two mosques full of people attending Friday prayers. Police stand outside a mosque in Linwood in Christchurch, New Zealand, on March 15.
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