ROUGH CUT - NO REPORTER NARRATION The main suspect in New Zealand's worst peacetime mass shooting intended to continue the rampage before he was caught by police, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Saturday (March 16).

Ardern also said that the police were working to remove bodies from the mosques by the end of the day.

Brenton Harrison Tarrant, a 28-year-old Australian citizen, appeared in a Christchurch District Court on Saturday and was remanded without a plea until his next scheduled appearance in the South Island city's High Court on April 5.

The attack on two mosques killed 49 people and wounded dozens, and eleven people remained in intensive care, hospital authorities said.