New hate crime stats in North 'just the tip of the iceberg': Yellowknife Islamic Centre

The number of hate crimes reported to police have gone up across the North and are "just the tip of the iceberg," according to the chair of the Islamic Centre of Yellowknife

There were 13 hate crimes reported to police in the three territories in 2019, according to data released by Statistics Canada Monday six in the Northwest Territories, five in Nunavut and two in Yukon.

Stats Canada acknowledged that fluctuations could reflect a change in the volume of hate crimes or a change in the number of reports.

Nazim Awan, chair, Islamic Society of North America (ISNA)Canada Islamic Centre of Yellowknife, said there are many reasons why a person would not report such an incident to police.

"Mostly, these are people who belong to minorities," he said. "Maybe [they are] new in Canada, English may not be their first language, and they may not have the ability, at the personal level to have the courage and access support systems."

Awan believes it should not be the victim's responsibility to report crimes motivated by hate.

"It is the responsibility of everybody in the community, or whoever sees any incident like this to take necessary legal action."

He also called the figures for the N.W.T. "alarming."

According to Statistics Canada's data, three of the cases in the N.W.T. were motivated by race or ethnicity while the other three were linked to sexual orientation.That's compared to one case the previous year, connected to race or ethnicity.

In Yukon, there had also been a single hate crime reported to police in 2018. The data said it was motivated by race or ethnicity, while in 2019, there was one case connected to race or ethnicity and another to religion.

Of the five reported hate crimes in Nunavut in 2019, two were linked to race or ethnicity and two were linked to sexual orientation, while the motivating factor for a fifth case wasn't known.

If the numbers sound low, Awan is encouraging people to consider population size. Six cases in the N.W.T., for example, is a higher percentage of cases than the 1,946 reported across Canada.

He's also encouraging people to consider the broader impact.

"Not only will it impact one family, a person, it will impact the community and I will say globally, Canada, so even one case is too much."

Statistics Canada said the number of police-reported hate crimes across Canada was up seven per cent in 2019, with increases in eight provinces as well as all the territories.

The data does not reflect police-reported hate crime linked to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the agency said, results from a recent survey showed that a larger proportion of visible minorities perceived an increase in race-based harassment or attacks.