A gay Syrian refugee was the grand marshal and he was joined by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the annual Vancouver Pride Parade on Sunday.
Ahmed “Danny” Ramadan rode in the back of a BMW that had his name written on it.
He also marched with his colleagues at Qmunity, a Vancouver-based organization that provides support and services to the area’s LGBT community.
“It was a great celebration and I’m very proud I got to be part of it,” Ramadan told the Washington Blade on Sunday.
“I felt a lot of love and support from folks I don’t know who were cheering me and showing me how welcomed I am here.”
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and members of his family also marched in the Pride parade.
Trudeau is the first sitting Prime Minister to participate in Vancouver’s parade although it’s not his first pride parade as he has marched twice before he became PM.
“What an incredible pleasure it is to be back here at pride this year here in Vancouver,” said Justin Trudeau along the route as he pushed a stroller with one of his children in it and his wife Sophie Grégoire joined him in waving enthusiastically to the crowd of roughly 500,000 people.
“It’s a time where the whole city, families, communities come out, we celebrate the great diversity that is such a strength of our country,” he said.
“We celebrate community, we celebrate family and all these things together. It means we’re going to have a great pride and it’s a pleasure for me to be here.”
Trudeau marched in the parade in 2014 and 2015 as leader of the Liberal party, but his participation in Sunday’s event follows the milestone he set earlier in July when he became the first sitting prime minister to march in Toronto’s Pride parade — the country’s largest.
Last Updated on Aug 2, 2016
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