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Hundreds remember Brighton siege victim Nick Hao at Melbourne service

Nick Hao was killed by during a siege in Brighton on 5 June, 2017.

Nick Hao was killed by during a siege in Brighton on 5 June, 2017. Photo: Supplied/ABC

Kai Hao, the innocent man killed in the Brighton siege last week, has been remembered as a committed family man and a hard worker.

The Chinese community held a memorial for Mr Hao in the Melbourne suburb of Mount Waverley this afternoon.

Federation of Chinese Associations Victoria president Junki Su said the community’s main focus now was to support Mr Hao’s parents and wife.

“He’s a hard-working person and took care of his family and also, importantly, he wanted to take care of his parents,” she said.

“In China we have one-child families, so for Mr Hao, part of his responsibility was to take care of his parents.”

Mr Hao and his wife married just two months ago.

Speaking through a translator, his mother said the family was planning a momentous trip to China later this year to meet relatives after her son’s special milestone.

She said she would now be carrying his ashes back to China instead.

The ceremony heard Mr Hao played a vital role in caring for his father, who is in poor health after suffering a stroke.

Mr Hao arrived in Australia 10 years ago, determined to make a new life.

He spent the first six studying in Gippsland and eventually bought a house in Melbourne.

He convinced his parents to move to Australia so he could support them as they grew older.

Killed for being in ‘wrong place at the wrong time’

Mr Hao, 36, was working at Buckingham Serviced Apartments on Monday night when he was shot dead by Yacqub Khayre.

He had no connection with Khayre and police said he was simply in the “wrong place at the wrong time”.

Khayre also took a woman hostage in a room in the building, but after a two-hour stand-off, he stormed out, shooting at police before they shot and killed him.

The woman was rescued unharmed.

Khayre had a history of violence and was acquitted over a terror plot to attack a Sydney army base in 2009. He was on parole at the time of the attack for non-terror related crimes.

Victoria Police Commissioner Graham Ashton said the siege was being treated as a “terrorism incident”.

The memorial on Sunday was also a fundraiser, organised by the Chinese community, to support Mr Hao’s parents.

His funeral will be held at a later date.

Parents ‘have no-one to rely on’ after son’s death

Earlier this week, Mr Hao’s mother, who did not want to be named, said burying her son felt like the “end of the world”.

“My son is an Australian citizen and he has worked very hard in Australia and built a life for himself and has made a contribution to Australian society,” she said through a translator.

“Now I send him off to work one day and he never came back.”
She said she and her husband had moved to Australia about a year ago because their son wanted to look after and provide for them.

“When we came to Australia, we were looking forward to a family reunion but after the incident, the past few days have been the saddest and darkest days in our lives,” she said.

“We spent most of our savings on our son sending him to Australia and now we have lost all our hope and have no-one to rely on.”

– ABC

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