The Prime Minister says this act has revealed growing Islamophobia in the west and urged the international community to address the growing Islamophobia.
ISLAMABAD: (UrduPoint/Pakistan Point News-June 8th, 2021) Prime Minister Imran Khan has strongly condemned the killing of four members of a Muslim family in Canada, urging the international community to address the growing Islamophobia.
Taking to Twitter, Prime Minister Imran Khan said he saddened to learn the killing of Pakistani-origin Canadian citizens in London Ontario.
He wrote: “Saddened to learn of the killing of a Muslim Pakistani-origin Canadian family in London, Ontario. This condemnable act of terrorism reveals the growing Islamophobia in Western countries. Islamophonia needs to be countered holistically by the international community,”.
On Monday, Police in London, Ontario, quoting the witnesses, said that 20-year-old Nathaniel Veltman, jumped the curb in his vehicle on Sunday, struck five members of the family, ranging in age from 9 to 74, and then drove off at high speed.
Police arrested Veltman, a resident of London, and charged with four counts of first-degree murder and one count of attempted murder. The police produced them before the court on Thursday after being remanded to custody on Monday.
“It was pre-planned, premeditated act and motivated by hate and evidence is there,” said Paul Waight, the Detective Superintendent of London police department.
Waight said: “We believe the victims were targeted because of their Islamic faith," Waight said.
He stated that police in London - 200 km (120 miles) southwest of Toronto - were consulting with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and prosecutors about potentially filing terrorism charges.
The suspect does not have a criminal record, and is not known to be a member of a hate group, police said. He was arrested in a mall parking lot without incident while wearing a body-armor-type vest, police said. There is no evidence he had any accomplices. It was not immediately known if the suspect had hired a lawyer.
London Free Press said in a statement that among the dead were Syed Afzaal, 46, his wife, Madiha Salman, 44, and their 15-year-old daughter, Yumnah Afzaal. Syed Afzaal’s 74-year-old mother, whose name is not yet released, also died. Their 9-year-old son, Faez Afzaal, is in the hospital with serious but non-life-threatening injuries.
The family migrated to Canada from Pakistan about 14 years ago.
