Killing of Four Muslims in Canada Ruled as Terrorism

by Farooq Hussain

A Canadian judge ruled on Thursday that the killing of four Muslim family members in June 2021 was an act of terrorism. 

A truck drove into five members of the Afzaal family in Ontario in 2021, leaving only one survivor— a nine-year-old boy. The family was targeted due to their Muslim identity by a white supremacist named Nathaniel Veltman, 23.

According to the country’s criminal prosecution service,  the terrorism finding by Justice Renee Pomerance of the Superior Court of Justice of Ontario was the first in Canada against a far-right extremist. 

Veltman was convicted of first-degree murder in November and sentenced to life with no possibility of parole for 25 years for his crimes.

During his trial, Veltman did not deny his intention to ram into the family.

“One might go so far as to characterize this as a textbook example of terrorist motive and intent,” Justice Pomerance told the courtroom in London, Ontario, according to The Canadian Press, a news agency.

“He wanted to intimidate the Muslim community. He wanted to follow in the footsteps of other mass killers, and he wanted to inspire others to commit murderous acts,” she said,

“The offender did not know the victims,” she continued. “He had never met them. He killed them because they were Muslim.”

Veltman drove past the Afzaals near a busy intersection and made a U-turn to mow them down, prosecutors said during the trial. He killed three generations of the family, the youngest being Yumnah Afzaal, 15. The other victims included parents, Salman Afzaal, 46, and Madiha Salman, 44, and grandparent, Talat Afzaal, 74.