An Australian man, Brenton Tarrant, shot 51 people dead at two mosques in the city in March last year. Shortly afterwards, the government set up a committee to investigate whether the government made mistakes in the run-up to the attacks.
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The 792-page report shows that New Zealand’s security forces were ‘almost exclusively’ focused on the threat of Islamic terrorism and therefore had little regard for threats from other parts of society. The police would also have exercised insufficient control when issuing firearms licenses.
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The prime minister apologized for this. “Going forward, we must ensure that resources are adequately focused on the range of threats New Zealand faces. Every New Zealander deserves a system that does its best to protect all citizens. The committee does not conclude that the attacks could have been prevented, but we could have done more and I apologize for that. ”
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The investigation committee makes 44 recommendations to prevent attacks like the one in Christchurch in the future. Prime Minister Ardern has said she will take over completely. One of the most important advice is to set up a new intelligence service, which should mainly deal with counter-terrorism and investigate terrorist threats. New laws will also be introduced to combat digital hate speech and a program will be developed to learn to recognize signs of radicalization earlier.
Perpetrator Brenton Tarrant, who is known to have shot 51 people and attempted to kill 40 people, was sentenced to life in August. A sentence without the possibility of parole. It was the first time that New Zealand had imposed such a sentence. Tarrant, who claims to be inspired by the far-right Norwegian mass murderer Anders Breivik, broadcast the massacre he committed live on social media. 50 were injured.
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