Ottawa, June 24 (IANS) Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has denied meddling in an investigation into the 2020 mass shooting, the worst the country's history.
Brenda Lucki, head of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), has been accused of pressuring local officers to help advance Trudeau's gun control plans, the BBC quoted the Halifax Examiner as saying, which was the first to report on the development.
According to the Halifax Examiner, the accusation stemmed from notes made by a local RCMP officer, released as part of a public investigation into the mass shooting on April 18-19, 2020, during which a gunman posing as a police officer killed 22 people in Nova Scotia.
The suspect died in a stand-off with police.
Addressing reporters on Thursday, Trudeau said that his government "did not put any undo influence or pressure" on police.
"It is extremely important to highlight that it is only the RCMP, it is only police that determine what and when to release information," the BBC quoted the Prime Minister as saying.
Denying the accusations, Commissioner Lucki said in a statement released on Tuesday that information sharing between the federal government and police is normal during a high-profile event such as a mass shooting.
The RCMP chief however acknowledged that she "should have been more sensitive" in her approach.
Canada's opposition Conservative Party has called for a debate in the House of Commons, and a parliamentary committee voted on Thursday to hold a hearing into the matter.
In the wake of the deadliest rampage in Canadian history, Prime Minister Trudeau in May 2020 announced an immediate ban on the sale, transportation, importation, or use of some 1,500 makes and models of "military-grade assault-style" weapons.
Nine people were killed in the fiery Tuesday night crash and the two Canadians — Dayton Price, 19, of Mississauga, Ont., and Hayden Underhill, 20, of Amherstview, Ont. — suffered critical injuries.
The government's use of the emergency powers in February included allowing financial institutions to freeze the accounts of those involved in the protests that occupied streets in downtown Ottawa and blocked key border crossings.
On Monday, federal Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair finished a tour of B.C. communities that experienced devastating floods last November, including Abbotsford and Merritt, where some people still have not been able to move home.
There are 298 individuals hospitalized with COVID-19 and 49 are in intensive care. In the past 24 hours, seven new deaths have been reported, for an overall total of 2,960.
Several cabinet ministers gathered for a news conference to share details of $633 million first announced in Budget 2022 for supports over three years for people experiencing homelessness.
An investigation was launched in 2019 after a victim reported to police that she was sexually assaulted during treatment at a business operating as Fab Skin Care at 5481 Kingsway in Burnaby.
