“I unequivocally condemn it,” Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said of the proposed Koran burning in Florida. “We all enjoy freedom of religion and that freedom of religion comes from a tolerant spirit.”
“I don't speak very often about my own religion, but let me be very clear: My God and my Christ is a tolerant God, and that's what we want to see in this world,” he said, according to the Toronto-based Globe and Mail. "I don't think that's the way you treat other faiths, as different as those faiths may be from your own."
Canada's defense minister has also warned that the Florida event could harm NATO troops fighting abroad.
"It will incite further violence and hatred and I'm concerned that this will put Canadians and other ISAF (International Security Assistance Force) soldiers in harm's way," Defense Minister Peter MacKay said in an interview with public broadcaster CBC, according to Agence France-Presse.
More than half a million people are Muslim in Canada, according to the CIA World Factbook.
