A white supremacist group is growing its ranks in the London and St. Thomas areas of southwestern Ontario with the location of several meeting places now identified by CBC News.
Nationalist-13 has held several meetings and anti-immigration protests recently. It’s based in Hamilton, and is what’s known as an “active club.” Active clubs are part of a neo-Nazi network that has grown globally, moving from online forums into real-world communities, including some in southwestern Ontario.
The group held a rally in front of London’s city hall in late June, during which masked members held up banners with slogans reading “mass deportations now,” and “no blood for Israel”.
Following that protest, members posted a photograph with their faces digitally obscured by the Totenkopf, the grinning death mask used by the Nazi SS. The photograph is captioned “Nationalist-13 in London, Ontario, Canada.”
CBC’s visual investigation team looked at the picture, and matched the location to the Flying J truck stop on Highbury Avenue, south of the 401.
The group is holding their own Nationalist-13 flag, and the Red Ensign flag which was the precursor to the maple leaf. White nationalists call it Canada’s “true” flag, representing the country before they say it was spoiled by immigrants.
In a second photograph posted to the group’s Telegram account on May 30, two men are standing beside a punching bag in a park at night. “Members of NS13’s Youth Division training during the weekday. Training is a daily pursuit, not a weekend activity,” the post reads.
By matching the background of the photo to parks in the southwest, CBC’s visual investigation team traced the setting of the photo to Marshall Field Lakeside Pavillion in St. Thomas’s Pinafore Park.
It’s part of ongoing work, in collaboration with The Fifth Estate, that shows how groups that experts consider an extremist threat are recruiting and meeting in plain sight.
They bill themselves as defenders of the country’s European roots, and train, according to experts, for what they believe to be an upcoming race war.
“It’s deeply disturbing and troubling,” said Sunil Gurmukh, a human rights lawyer and Western University assistant professor who teaches courses on hate speech, and researches hate crimes.
“The youth themselves, they’re often more vulnerable and impressionable. That’s extremely troubling,” he said.
As the group works to recruit more people, many of their online posts ask like-minded men “of European folk” to contact them.
One message in the group’s Telegram channel praises a group of supposedly unaffiliated men who, while obscuring their faces, displayed a banner reading “mass deportations now” at London’s White Oaks Mall in December.
According to Gurmukh and other experts on extremism, the advent of social media has made it ever-easier for like-minded people to connect, and for these types of groups to grow.
But their tendency to hide their identities shows their ideas are still far from being widely accepted, he said.
“They’re cowards. If they truly believe what they’re spreading, then they should deal with any consequences,” Gurmukh said. “To me, when you look at the [SS symbol] they use to obscure their faces, with signs calling for mass deportation and the eradication of Jewish people, that amounts to criminal hate.”
On Thursday, a Windsor man was found guilty for participating in the activities of a terrorist group when he tried to join the far-right Atomwaffen Division, also called the National Socialist Order or the National Socialist Resistance Front.
The Canadian government has considered it a terrorist organization since 2021. The Nationalist-13 group does not have that designation.
CBC News contacted police in London and St. Thomas about the white supremacist groups meeting in their cities, and at a time when municipalities are committing thousands of dollars to anti-hate campaigns.
London received $500,000 from the province for it’s ‘Stop Tolerhating’ campaign last year.
The London Police Service said in a statement that it’s “aware of concerns related to self-proclaimed white nationalist groups operating in the region,” and that all allegations of criminal offences are investigated.
The St. Thomas Police Service provided a statement echoing that, adding that “participation in a group or club, including using public or private facilities for training purposes is not, in itself, a criminal offence.”
In a previous investigation, the visual investigations unit found groups were conducting combat training in martial arts studios and in other parks in southern Ontario.
In St. Thomas, people enjoying the park near Marshall Field Lakeside Pavillion said they were shocked and disappointed to hear of the group’s presence in an area frequented by children and families.
