Checks ‘too weak’ to have stopped mosque massacre
THE Christchurch massacre that killed 51 Muslim worshippers last year was unpreventable, an inquiry has found.
But New Zealand checks for firearms licences were too weak and the country’s intelligence agency was focused on Islamist terrorism rather than white supremacists, a Royal Commission of Inquiry report concluded.
The inquiry was launched after Brenton Tarrant opened fire on worshippers at the Al Noor mosque, broadcasting the atrocity on Facebook Live.
The Australian then continued his rampage at Linwood Islamic Centre
before police arrested him. He was jailed for life without parole this year.
The white supremacist, who arrived in New Zealand in 2017, had kept a low profile and told no-one of his plans, even as he collected a large trove of ammunition, the inquiry found.
The report said the former personal trainer, now 30, had been a keen gamer since he was six and had started expressing racist ideas as a 14-year-old.
In New Zealand, he did not have a job, as he inherited £253,000 when his father Rodney killed himself in 2010. He only met people at a gym and the rifle club where he practised.
Police admitted they ‘could have done more’ to check how well Tarrant was known by his gun-licence referees – a gaming friend and his father. But the report said there was no way his plans could have been detected ‘except by chance’. Prime minister Jacinda Ardern (pictured) said she would act on the inquiry’s recommendation of setting up a new intelligence agency to focus on international threats and counter-terrorism.
She said: ‘While the commission made no findings that (agency) issues would have stopped the attack, these were failings nonetheless and, for that, on behalf of the government I apologise.’