Canadian Muslim council urges immediate summit on Islamophobia
OTTAWA, JUN 10: BA Canadian Muslim group demanded on Wednesday that all levels of the government immediately convene a National Action Summit on Islamophobia.
The National Council of Canadian
Muslims (NCCM) established an online petition that has already garnered 22,287
signatures as of early Wednesday afternoon.
The call for action was spurred
by the murder of four members of a Muslim family, victims of a hit and run
"terrorist attack" on Sunday in London, Ontario.
"We call on all levels of
government-federal, provincial, territorial, municipal-across the country to
come together for a National Action Summit on Islamophobia to take immediate
action on dismantling both violent forms of Islamophobia and systemic
Islamophobia," according to a statement.
"These actions are urgent
and necessary to ensure that no one else suffers the way #OurLondonFamily has
suffered."
The NCCM move followed a vigil
Tuesday in London and across Canada, attended by thousands. Several speakers
urged politicians to not just express sorrow for the deaths, but to take steps
to combat Islamophobia.
Nusaiba Al-Azem from the London
Mosque was one who demanded "an immediate action summit on
Islamophobia."
Salman Afzaal, 46, his wife
Madiha Salman, 44, their 15-year-old daughter Yumna Afzaal and Salman Afzaal's
74-year-old mother, Talat, were killed, while their son Fayez, 9, remains in a
hospital with serious but non-life threatening injuries.
They were run down by a truck
while taking a walk and were standing at an intersection when a half-ton truck
jumped the curb and plowed into them.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau,
who was at the vigil in London, said there was no doubt it was a
"terrorist attack" motivated by hate.
It was not the first horrendous
attack on Muslims on Canadian soil. It was just a little over four years ago on
Jan. 29, 2017, when a gunman attacked a Quebec City Mosque, killing six
worshippers and wounding 19.
Along with the petition, the NCCM
struck a defiant note in its statement.
"We will never be
intimidated. We will never stop marching for love, justice, and goodness. We
stand with #OurLondonFamily."
No government officials had
responded to the call for action as of early Wednesday.
Separately, the US-based Council
on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) called on President Joe Biden on Tuesday
to condemn and confront the growing phenomenon of global Islamophobia following
the attack.
America's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, in a statement, also urged Biden to appoint a special envoy to "monitor and combat Islamophobia, which has spread from America and endangered Muslims in Austria, China, Burma, France, India, Israel, Kashmir, and numerous other countries."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
COURTESY Anews
--------------
Comments
Post a Comment