News Desk :
A Canadian driver deliberately plowed his white Ryder rental van into a lunch-hour crowd in Toronto on Monday, killing 10 people and injuring 15 along a roughly mile-long (1.6-km) stretch of sidewalk thronged with pedestrians, police said.
Although the attack had the hallmarks of recent deadly vehicle assaults by Islamic State supporters in the United States and Europe, federal officials said it did not represent a larger threat to national security.
Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders identified the suspect as Alek Minassian, 25, who he said had not previously been known to authorities. Police, who quickly arrested Minassian, do not know his motives.
“The actions definitely looked deliberate,” Saunders told a late-night news conference close to the site of the incident in the northern section of Canada’s biggest city, noting the van had been driven along side walks.
The brutal incident – which Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called a “tragic and senseless attack” was one of the most violent in recent Canadian history.
Federal Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale, standing next to Saunders, said: “There would appear to be no national security connections.”
Global Television said Minassian would appear in a Toronto court at 10 am ET (1400 GMT) on Tuesday.
The attack shook the usually peaceful streets of Toronto, a major tourist destination. The city, which has a population of 2.8 million, recorded 61 murders last year.
BBC adds: Canadian police are questioning the suspected driver of the rented van. Meanwhile, an officer has been praised for not opening fire during a tense standoff with the suspect, who claimed to be armed.
Video broadcast on CBC News showed a man pointing what appeared to be a gun at officers and shouting “kill me”. The officer tells the man to “get down” and when the suspect says he has a gun, the officer repeats: “I don’t care. Get down.” The suspect was then arrested without shots being fired.
Reza Hashemi, who owns a video shop on Yonge Street, told the BBC he heard screaming on the other side of the road. He said the van was repeatedly mounting the pavement and running into people.
One witness told City News that the driver was “hitting anything that comes in the way”.
“People, fire hydrants, there’s mail boxes being run over,” said the unnamed man, who said he was driving behind the van during the incident.
As the van continued, the man said he sounded his horn to try to warn pedestrians. “I witnessed at least six, seven people being hit and flying in the air, like killed, on the street,” he said.
Pictures from the scene showed bodies covered in orange sheets along the van’s route. Debris and items of clothing were scattered across the pavements and road.
The van was brought to a halt by police several streets away and was quickly surrounded.
The suspect was arrested 26 minutes after the first emergency call was made to the police.
Police said Minassian was from the northern Toronto suburb of Richmond Hill and was not previously known to authorities.
