Demonstration against NATO: Valérie Plante denounces hatred and thugs

The mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante, in turn strongly denounced the violence of last Friday’s demonstration for Canada’s withdrawal from NATO. In addition to showing her full support for the Montreal City Police Service (SPVM), she recalled that hatred towards the Jewish and Arab-Muslim communities would not be tolerated.

Protesting is a constitutional right, but not to the detriment of a community or people or to make them feel like they don’t belong.she told journalists Monday noon, during a press briefing in front of neighborhood station 20, in downtown Montreal.

Since the start of the conflict in the Middle East, agents of the SPVM were mobilized for more than 500 demonstrations, indicated Mayor Plante.

The SPVM has been facing a particularly intense situation for a year and Montrealers are also being put to the testshe stressed.

She says she has received numerous messages in recent months from members of the Arab-Muslim and Jewish communities, who fear for their safety.

We must reiterate, say loud and clear, that gestures and words such as we saw and heard over the weekend, which are clearly anti-Semitic, have no place in Montreal.

She also had a message to send to the rioters, to whom she attributes responsibility for the mayhem and violence of last Friday’s demonstration.

We will never let thugs endanger the safety of othersaffirmed Ms. Plante, who expects, as SPVMto other arrests linked to the events.

So far, three people have been arrested and released on a promise to appear in court.

The thugs are those who were there to break things, to break up windows for no reason, if only by provocation or to divert attention. They are known to the police. It could have been a demonstration on housing, on the economy or even in support of Palestine and they would have been thereshe said.

She regrets that these people are taking advantage of the presence of ordinary citizens to come distort demonstrations.

I want to say that they are coming to steal demonstrations from people who do it out of conviction and in a peaceful manner.estimated Mayor Plante.

A rare slip-up, underlines the head of the SPVM

For his part, the director of SPVMFady Dagher, wanted to put certain things into perspective by emphasizing the exceptional nature of recent events.

In connection with the conflict [au Proche-Orient]in almost 500 demonstrations, very, very few went wrong. There was one, with the images we sawhe said in an interview on the show All one morningon HERE FIRST.

And you have to be careful; This is not what is happening in Montreal. This is what happened in Montreal in one place, for five minutes. It’s very different.

Mr. Dagher also recalled that other demonstrations, which took place earlier in the day on Friday in Montreal, had gone very well.

All afternoon we had several marches, with several hundred people, and everything was done peacefully. It was around 6:30 p.m. that a group infiltrated the mass of 800 and they had another agenda. They infiltrated a crowd where there are completely peaceful people, who are there for a cause.

Federal ministers Bill Blair and Mélanie Joly as well as Quebec Prime Minister François Legault also denounced the violence of the demonstrations againstI’LL TAKE.

The 70th annual session of the Parliamentary Assembly ofI’LL TAKE began last Friday at the Palais des congrès de Montréal. The Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, addressed the assembly on Monday, at the conclusion of the meeting.