CHRISTCHURCH: Following a day of extreme and shocking violence, an eerie hush has fallen over Christchurch as the city begins to grieve.
At a cordoned-off intersection, just metres from the Al Noor Mosque, where a heavily armed gunman began his live-streamed racist killing spree on Friday, people stand around in silence as others step forward to place flowers or cards at one of the city’s numerous makeshift memorials.
The sky is overcast and the air is filled with the smell of flowers. Two girls crouch closely together as they try to light candles.
Further along Dean Avenue, which borders a large park, only the mosque’s copper-coloured dome is visible from outside the police cordon. “You really wouldn’t know there was a mosque there,” said Anthony, who has lived in the area for around 20 years.
The IT worker in his 60s, who did not want to give his surname, said he had often seen worshippers arriving at the mosque and described the city’s Muslim community as “very quiet and peaceful.”
“I think the Prime Minister has said it very well: This [attack] is not Christchurch, this is not New Zealand,” he said.
Forty-one members of that community were shot dead by the 28-year-old Australian gunman, who then killed seven more at a mosque in the Linwood Islamic Centre, about five kilometres away. Another victim later died in hospital, where on Saturday flowers and posters had been laid.
One poster, which had been written and colourfully decorated by children, read: “In loving memory of all the beautiful Muslims who had their whole beautiful lives ripped away... we will always walk with you side by side.”
M D Lidon Biswas, who was walking past empty playing fields that are usually full of life on Saturdays, said he usually attended Friday prayers at the Al Noor Mosque but was running late on the day of the attack. As he arrived in his car, he heard shooting.
“I just couldn’t believe it was going on in the mosque because I believed New Zealand is a good country, New Zealand is a safe country,” he said.
He said he saw bodies on the ground and friends of his with gunshot injuries.
Biswas, who is from the Bangladeshi city of Khulna and has been living in New Zealand for seven years, said he had never detected any Islamaphobia in his adopted country: “Before yesterday, we were thinking New Zealand was a haven country.”
The evening after the attack, he said he was scared that somebody would come kill him. Biswas said good friends of his were killed on Friday, including one whose wife in Bangladesh depended on him for financial support.
On Saturday, he spent the morning waiting for the bodies of victims in the mosque to be released so they could be buried quickly, in line with Muslim tradition.
People pay their respects by placing flowers for the victims of the mosques attacks in Christchurch. — AFP[/caption]
Nearby, a brick wall along the edge of the Botanic Garden has been transformed into one of the South Island city’s largest memorials.
Greg, a 27-year-old Briton who has been living in Christchurch for a year and a half, said he came to the memorial to pay his respects, read the cards and look at the tributes — including a box of licorice and dates — left by mourners.
Like other memorials in Christchurch, nobody spoke louder than a whisper, but here, the noise from generators being used by some of the many TV crews that had rushed to the city hummed noisily in the background.
“There’s a surreal atmosphere here,” said Greg. “This kind of stuff doesn’t happen in sleepy New Zealand. And it definitely doesn’t happen in Christchurch. In America these things happen, and there’s no change. Hopefully the government here will do something.”
He said the country would change as a result, and he believed Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern would change gun laws in the country.
Jacinda has vowed to toughen the country’s gun laws after revealing the alleged shooter behind Christchurch’s mosque attacks had legally bought the five weapons, including two semi-automatic rifles, used in the massacre.
The nation’s firearms laws are lax compared to neighbouring Australia, which enacted a strict gun control regime in the wake of a similar massacre in 1996.
Jacinda said 28-year-old Australian Brenton Tarrant obtained a “Category A” gun licence in November 2017 which allowed him to purchase the weapons used to mow down worshippers in two Christchurch mosques.
Some of the guns appear to have been modified to make them more deadly, she said, adding that a ban on semi-automatic weapons would be considered. “The mere fact... that this individual had acquired a gun licence and acquired weapons of that range, then obviously I think people will be seeking change, and I’m committing to that,” she told a press conference.
“I can tell you one thing right now — our gun laws will change.” Jacinda confirmed that the suspected gunman and two associates who were also arrested had not been on the radar of any intelligence agencies for extremism. — DPA/AFP
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
