Vandals using high pressure hose spray green paint on the statue to Queen Victoria in downtown Montreal. Photo: anonymous vandals

Montreal vandals attack Queen Victoria statues

After vandalism against a Montreal statue dedicated to Sir John A Macdonald last year, more historic statues in the city were vandalised last night, by the same or similar individuals.

The statue dedicated to Sir John A Macdonald- the Father of Confederation-was attacked by vandals last year just prior to Remembrance Day. 2017 PHOTO: Simon Nakonechny/CBC

Last night, two Montreal statues representing Queen Victoria were sprayed with green paint apparently by an obscure group calling itself the Delhi-Dublin Anti-Colonial Solidarity Brigade.

The technique used to vandalise the statues was the same in both cases.

In last years case,the statue of Macdonald, known as Canada’s Father of Confederation, was sprayed with a “red substance” in an action claimed by a vague group of “anti-capitalist, anti-racist, anti-colonialists” who posted a statement online that Macdonald was a “white supremacist” and blamed him for the highly controversial and abusive residential school system for indigenous children.

The Victoria Memorial in downtown Montreal was unveiled in 1872, while the other bronze statue to Queen Victoria at McGill University was unveiled in 1900.

Bronze statue to Queen Victoria on Sherbrooke Street in front of McGill University’s Schulick School of Music, shown prior to being vandalised last night by an obscure group claiming to be anti-racist PHOTO: google streetview

Both statues were vandalised with green paint, just days before St Patrick’s Day celebrations.

In a message today related to this latest damage, the group said in part that the “racist statues” are an insult to oppressed people worldwide and to the legacy of revolt by “Irish freedom fighters”.

It goes on using words to describe the reign of Queen Victoria as being a criminal legacy, “which continues to be whitewashed in history books and in popular media” adding words like genocide, torture, massacre, and more, and concludes with a call for others to undertake similar criminal acts. The damage will likely be quickly repaired at substantial cost to taxpayers in both cases.

In 1963, the terrorist Quebec separatist group, the FLQ, placed a dynamite bomb at the base of the Queen Victoria statue in Quebec City, causing severe damage to the statue the remains of which are now in a Quebec City museum.

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