A member of Queenstown's Muslim community has told of seeing small children playing at a Christchurch mosque recently and being unable to sleep after Friday's terror attacks there in which he lost family and friends.
Ashiv Khan spoke to 1 NEWS at a moving vigil candlelight vigil at Queenstown's Earnslaw Park tonight where hundreds of people paid respects to the 50 people killed in Friday's shootings at two Christchurch mosques.
The large crowd at the vigil, led by Mayor Jim Boult, included members of the local Muslim community, emergency services and religious leaders of all denominations.
Muslim community member Mr Khan said some worshipers form the area visited one of the Christchurch mosques recently for a collection because they have just recently purchased a property for the Queenstown members of the faith.
"So we were there and we were sitting the same place. And when we saw the videos we were really sad, we were really down, you know," he said.
"And we saw the kids, the kids were playing with us, you know, the small kids, three years, five years. And they have already died.
"We couldn't sleep the night we had after that, Saturday and Sunday. We just opened eyes, we can just think about the kids, what had happened. We never thought it was going to happen to about four to 500 people there."
Mr Khan said a lot of family members and friends were in the mosque at the time of the shooting and have died.
"And most of them are relatives. Basically three people passed away from Fiji. And one of them was our priest and two of them which I know, they were neighbours in where I used to live in Fiji."
Mr Khan said the turnout to the vigil was amazing.
"I was really, really happy. On behalf of the Muslim Queenstown community I would like to thank each and everyone for the support they have provided during these sad times," he said.
Asked what the way forward is after the attacks, Mr Khan said, "We have to be positive, we have to go forward. We have to prevent whatever happened, We have to continue our life as usual."
Mr Khan said he still feels "100 per cent safe" in New Zealand.
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