MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazilian woman among 11 dead as SUV rams people at festival in Vancouver

Kiara Salim was a 34-year-old musician from Rio de Janeiro who had been living in Canada for approximately three years

A Brazilian woman was among the 11 fatalities left by a 30-year-old man with a history of mental health issues, who late Saturday drove an SUV into a crowd at the Filipino Lapu-Lapu Day festival in Vancouver, Canada, also injuring dozens.

The incident occurred in the Sunset neighborhood during a Filipino cultural celebration. The suspect was subdued by festival-goers and arrested, with police ruling out terrorism as a motive.

Vancouver Police Chief Rai called it the “darkest day in Vancouver's history.” The attack took place two days before Canada's federal election, prompting condolences from Prime Minister Mark Carney, who resumed campaigning after expressing solidarity with the Filipino community. The investigation continues, with no clear motive established.

The Brazilian Kiara Salim was a 34-year-old musician from Rio de Janeiro, who had been living in Canada for approximately three years, where she worked as a teacher at a school in New Westminster, about 20 kilometers from downtown Vancouver. Posts on X described her as a talented musician who was well-regarded in her community.

“While I cannot comment at this time on a possible motive, I can now say with confidence that the evidence in this case does not lead us to believe that this is a terrorist act,” Rai said. “There are already 11 confirmed fatalities, and we believe there are dozens more injured, some of them seriously,” he added while warning that the death toll could rise. “There were no known threats to the event or to the Filipino community,” he also pointed out.

“The community will feel this for a long time,” RJ Aquino, chair of the community advocacy group Filipino BC, told reporters. “We want to tell everybody that we’re grieving. We want to tell everybody that we see and hear the support from around the world at this point.”

It was not the first incident of this nature in Canada. In 2021, a man killed four members of a Muslim family by running them over with a pickup truck. In 2018, a man drove a rented van into a lunch-hour crowd in Toronto, killing 10 people and injuring 15 along a sidewalk thronged with pedestrians.

The festival honored Datu Lapu-Lapu, a Filipino chieftain who defeated Spanish forces led by Ferdinand Magellan in the Battle of Mactan in 1521. The government of British Columbia officially recognized April 27 as Lapu-Lapu Day in 2023.