Breaking News Emails
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Saturday vowed “our gun laws will change” after a mass shooting at two mosques in the city of Christchurch killed 49 people and wounded dozens more Friday.
Ardern said at a news conference that she was advised that the gunman had five firearms — two semi-automatic weapons, two shotguns and a lever-action firearm — and that he had a gun license acquired in November 2017.
"While work is being done as to the chain of events that led to both the holding of this gun license and the possession of these weapons, I can tell you one thing right now: Our gun laws will change," Ardern said.
She noted that there have been attempts to change the nation's gun laws in the past, most recently in 2017, but said "now is the time for change."
"When people, of course, hear that this individual acquired a gun license and acquired weapons of that range, then obviously I think people will be seeking change, and I am committing to that," the prime minister said.
One man, an Australian citizen, has been arrested and charged with murder in the attacks that authorities have called an unprecedented act of violence.
Two others were arrested and “inquiries are ongoing to establish whether the other two who were arrested were directly involved with this incident,” Ardern said.
None of those apprehended had a criminal history in New Zealand or Australia, and they were not on watch lists in either country, she said.
Officers responded to reports of shots fired Friday afternoon. The two mosques are about three miles apart, and the second mosque was attacked about 45 minutes after the first.
Ardern said the Australian citizen charged with murder had traveled the world and had “sporadically” been in and out of New Zealand. She said agencies would be piecing together his travel and the sequence of events that led to him getting a gun license.
The prime minister said that the man got the license in November 2017 and began purchasing the guns the following month.
He has been described by officials as a "right-wing extremist terrorist," and appeared to post a lengthy manifesto before the attack detailing his white-supremacist worldview.
A fourth person taken into custody Friday "was a member of the public who was in possession of a firearm, but with the intention of assisting police," Ardern said. That person has been released.