New Zealand mosque imam: ‘We still love this country’

SRINAGAR: An imam who was leading prayers at a Christchurch mosque when a gunman brandishing semiautomatic weapons mowed down his congregation has said that the Muslim community’s love for New Zealand would not be shaken by the massacre.

At least 49 people, including children, were killed in Friday’s attacks targeting the Al Noor and Linwood mosques – the deadliest shooting in modern New Zealand history.

“We still love this country,” said Ibrahim Abdul Halim, the imam of Linwood Mosque, on Saturday, vowing that “extremists would never ever touch our confidence”.

Halim gave a harrowing account of the moment during the Friday prayers when gunshots rang out in the mosque, replacing peaceful reflection with screaming, bloodshed and death.

“Everyone laid down on the floor, and some women started crying, some people died immediately,” he told the AFP news agency.

But, he said, New Zealand Muslims still felt at home in the South Pacific nation.

“My children live here,” he said, adding, “we are happy.”

He said the majority of New Zealanders “are very keen to support all of us, to give us full solidarity”, describing how strangers exchanged hugs with him on Saturday.

“They start to… give me big hugs, and give me more solidarity. This is something very important.”