Charlottesville solidarity rally held in Halifax

A crowd gathered Tuesday evening in Halifax as a show of solidarity with counter-protesters at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Va., that turned deadly last weekend. 

The rally planned to hold a moment of silence for Heather Heyer, a counter-protester who was killed Saturday in Charlottesville when a car plowed into a crowd.

"I knew I had to come to the rally because I believe that you must stand up for what you believe in," said Kim Wall, one of about 200 protesters who demonstrated in Halifax Tuesday night.

"This is just insane that it's become a bigger issue than it was the last time I protested this issue ... how is this issue growing? This isn't right."

Virginia clash

James Alex Fields, a 20-year-old man identified as a white nationalist, has been charged with second-degree murder in Heyer's death.

The violence occurred as white supremacists and neo-Nazis clashed with counter-protesters over the planned removal of a statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee.

In Halifax on Tuesday, demonstrators gathered around another controversial statue — one of Edward Cornwallis — that has sparked protests and calls for its removal from a downtown park. 

Cornwallis, a governor of Nova Scotia, was a military officer credited by the British for founding Halifax in 1749. Later that year, he issued a bounty on the scalps of Mi'kmaq people.

Proud Boys update

On Canada Day, a demonstration at the site of the statue organized by Mi'kmaq activists was interrupted by five members of the Proud Boys — a group associated with the far right that is in favour of keeping the Cornwallis monument.

The Proud Boys describes themselves as a "fraternal organization of Western chauvinists who will no longer apologize for creating the modern world."

The five members were later identified as being members of the Canadian Armed Forces and suspended while a military review was underway.

That investigation has since concluded.

"The investigation results are being reviewed before any additional measures are being taken," said Lt.-Cmdr. Jordan Holder.

Alex Khasnabish, an associate professor of sociology and anthropology at Mount Saint Vincent University, was one of the hundreds of people who attended the rally. 

Khasnabish, wearing an anti-fascist t-shirt, said he attended to express his solidarity with the anti-racist, anti-facist protesters in Virginia and to express support for the removal of the Cornwallis statue.

"I'm here to take a strong stand against against the really odious rise of white nationalism, white supremacy and facism that we're seeing around the world, but especially  across the U.S. and even in Canada today," said Khasnabish.

'Learning to live with justice and dignity'

Khasnabish said he wasn't surprised to see the violence in Charlottesville, but he was "pretty horrified  to see swastikas, sieg heils, other symbols of Nazi regalia and KKK and white supremacist symbology being mobilized in 2017."

The Halifax demonstration, Khasnabish said, wasn't about blaming or shaming white people as an entire group.

"But it is about learning to live with justice and dignity with other peoples, especially the first inhabitants of these territories. And we can't do that unless we come to a serious accounting of what we owe to those people and what the historical legacy of settler colonialism has been in this country," he said.