Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper has announced that his nation is committed to strengthening its laws regarding terrorism and national security.
PM Harper said his cabinet would ensure that plans are in the making, and hoped that laws would be passed to help Canada’s national security apparatus defend the country against terror, the BBC reported.
Harper’s comments came after two separate jihadist attacks on Canadian soldiers in the past several days, leaving two innocents dead and one wounded. On Monday, an Islamist radical ran over two Canadian soldiers with his vehicle, killing one and wounding another. On Wednesday, an Islamist in Ottawa gunned down an unarmed Canadian soldier while serving on his post at the National War Memorial.
Harper said to fellow members of Parliament, “I know we will always stand together.” He promised that Canadian authority are working on measures to toughen Canada’s stance on terror. “They need to be much strengthened, and I assure you, Mr. Speaker, that work which is already under way will be expedited,” Harper added. “We will be vigilant, but we will not run scared. We will be prudent, but we will not panic.”
The Canadian Prime Minister described the Ottawa gunman as an “ISIL-inspired terrorist.”
Separately, Susan Bibeau, the mother of the Ottawa jihadi, has spoken out. She claimed that, until recently, she had not seen her son in quite some time, and has apologized for the horrific actions he committed. “He was lost and did not fit in. I his mother spoke with him last week over lunch, I had not seen him for over five years before that,” she said. “We also wish to apologize for all the pain, fright and chaos [he] created. We have no explanation to offer.”
The Ottawa shooter was a 32-year-old recent convert to Islam named Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, who was reportedly on Canada’s terror watchlist. His mother is reportedly a government official who works in Canada’s immigration services, and his father is said to be a Libyan national.