Latest news with #SameerZuberi
Montreal Gazette
10-05-2025
- Politics
- Montreal Gazette
‘A few dozen' Uyghur refugees are now in Canada as part of lagging refugee program, MP confirms
By 'A few dozen' Uyghur refugees have now been resettled in Canada, the MP behind a motion promising to resettle 10,000 of them confirmed to The Gazette on Saturday. While the motion, which passed Parliament unanimously in 2023, called to resettle all 10,000 refugees by the end of 2025, Ottawa had only managed to resettle one refugee prior to this latest group of arrivals. MP Sameer Zuberi wouldn't specify how many Uyghur refugees have been resettled, or could he say when exactly they began arriving, telling The Gazette only they'd arrived in the past few weeks and he'd met with some of them. Uyghurs, who are native to the Xinjiang region of China, have suffered repression at the hands of the Chinese government, with an estimated one million people detained in hundreds of facilities across the region, according to Human Rights Watch. Considered a genocide by the House of Commons, Chinese state repression has allegedly included enslavement, sexual violence, forced sterilization, mass surveillance and the repression of the Uyghur language and Islamic faith. In April, Zuberi told The Gazette he was frustrated at the resettlement program's slow pace. He pointed to the civil service as the potential source of the hold up, saying 'they're the only ones who are at this point not moving on it.' He reiterated that call for accountability Saturday. 'At the end of the day, the civil service is the vehicle by which the government's operations happen.' 'I'd like to see the civil service move faster on this and all the government move faster on this,' he said. Though Zuberi admitted immigration authorities were nowhere near their goal of resettling 10,000 Uyghur refugees by the end of 2025, he said he wasn't ruling it out as a possibility. 'I believe that with political will we will achieve it.'
CBC
25-03-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Montreal Liberal candidate says campaign volunteers targeted with Islamophobic slurs
Sameer Zuberi, the Liberal candidate running for re-election in the riding of Pierrefonds—Dollard in Montreal's West Island, says two of his campaign volunteers were targeted with Islamophobic slurs. In an interview with CBC Tuesday, Zuberi said a mother and her 15 year-old daughter were hanging campaign posters in the riding Monday evening when a man drove up to them and rolled down the window of his car. "He was honking and they thought that he was, you know, supportive," Zuberi said. "Instead, he shouted at them, said he's going to tear down those posters and started shouting Islamophobic slurs with F-bombs," Zuberi said. Zuberi said the man then drove off. The mother and daughter were shaken by the incident. He said they filed a police complaint at his urging. Montreal police were not able to immediately confirm if they were investigating. Zuberi believes they were targeted because they were working for him. His father was born in Pakistan and he's Muslim. "They were not wearing any visible attire that would identify them as Muslim," Zuberi said. "I was very disturbed. You know, these are volunteers who are giving their time," he said. Not the first time candidate targeted During the 2021 campaign several of Zuberi's campaign posters were vandalized with racist slurs. Zuberi said he hesitated about speaking out about this latest incident, but ultimately decided to post about it on social media. "I don't want to be the guy who's only known for getting the racial attacks during a campaign," he said. "There's so much more to offer other than just that, but this behaviour is deeply problematic and it's not proper in our democracy," he said. The Canadian Muslim Forum also condemned the incident. "There is a general sense — that is very sad and devastating — this sense of normalization of hate, Islamophobia and discrimination," forum president Samer Majzoub told CBC in an interview. "It is a bitter reality. But this is nothing new," he said. Zuberi added: "For people to have different opinions and to debate them robustly, even sometimes uncomfortably, that's just fine. But there are limits to that, right?" The Liberal candidate believes social media has played a role in enabling hateful speech. There are dozens of hateful and racist replies to Zuberi's post about the incident on social media platform X. "I think just as citizens and as residents, we need to have a conversation about how we enter conversations," Zuberi said. "What is it that is appropriate? And what is it that that goes beyond the bounds?" he said. Craig Sauvé, the NDP candidate in Lasalle—Émard—Verdun, posted a message of support on X. "My full solidarity with you and your campaign team. Racist attacks are unacceptable and Islamophobia has no place in Canada," Sauvé posted.
