Heightened Vancouver police response on 1-year anniversary of Oct. 7 attacks

Sgt. Steve Addison with the Vancouver police said there are a number of planned and unplanned events expected to take place and officers have stepped up patrols.

More Vancouver police officers have been deployed around the city on Monday as the world marks one year since the Oct. 7 attacks.

Sgt. Steve Addison with the Vancouver police said there are a number of planned and unplanned events expected to take place and officers have stepped up patrols to make sure everyone stays safe.

“We have to acknowledge that there’s a lot of emotions in the community,” Addison said.

“There’s a lot of fear and anxiety today on the first year anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks. We’re here to provide a sense of calm, safety and reassurance to the community by providing a visible police presence not only here at the Jewish community centre with our mobile command centre but elsewhere in the community.”

Addison said uniformed school liaison officers have also been deployed along with members of the emergency response team at high-profile locations throughout the city.

“Our objective is to maintain calm, peace and reassurance in the community at a time when people are feeling quite uneasy,” he added.

Addison said there were several events over the weekend, including thousands of people who gathered on Saturday and marched through the streets of Vancouver.

He said there were no serious events, but noted there were some incidents where officers had to intervene to prevent people from breaching the peace or inciting violence.