TTC, GO grapple with two anti-Muslim incidents in one day

The TTC is working with police to identify three suspects, two men and a woman who “accosted” two women wearing hijabs on a subway train around 6:15 p.m.at Sherbourne subway station on Wednesday.

Two men and a woman boarded the train and began to make racist comments about the two Muslim women.

“There is an allegation of words about them being terrorists”, Ross said, adding that one of the suspects pushed another TTC rider during the altercation.

“It’s anti-Muslim clearly and it’s displays a few violence against women as well”.

A witness on the train activated the emergency alarm but the offenders fled before Toronto police officers and TTC special constables arrived.

He says statements by all three – the victims and the witness – were given to police.

“The TTC condemns this behaviour and racist acts utterly and completely”.

“We say enough. We call on all Canadians to come together”, said Debbie Douglas, executive director of the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants.

A representative of the company behind GO Transit made similar comments on Thursday after racist graffiti was found on one of its trains.

“We’re cleaning it now, depending on what it was what they used, it may or may not be that easy to get off. But it won’t go back into service until it’s removed”, Metrolinx spokesperson Anne Marie Aikins told Global News.

“We have absolutely no tolerance for discrimination or racism”, Aikins said. “We will not tolerate this behaviour and we deeply apologize to anybody hurt by this”.

This incident is the latest anti-Muslim incident in the city following the attacks on Paris.

A mosque was torched in Peterborough, Ont., on Sunday and a Hindu temple in Kitchener, Ont., had their windows smashed.