From: The Encyclopedia of Canada's Peoples/Bosnian Muslims/Paul Robert Magocsi
The first Bosnian Moslems arrived in Canada immediately after World War II. Most were single males of various socio-economic backgrounds and occupations who had been soldiers in the army of wartime independent Croatia. When in 1945 the Yugoslav state was re-established, the Communist regime headed by the partisan leader Tito carried out widespread reprisals against all supporters of wartime Croatia, including Bosnian Muslims. Among the soldiers who managed to flee abroad were those who had fought in the army of independent Croatia, as well as a few who had fought with Tito’s partisans but had become disillusioned with the establishment of a Communist regime in post-war Yugoslavia. There were as well Bosnian Muslims who had spent the war in German labour camps, while others had been sent to fight for Germany at the Russian front. At the war’s end, all these people found themselves in displaced persons’ camps in Italy, Germany, and Austria, and from there they eventually made their way to Canada. While a few were devoted Muslims who had experienced an intensive religious education and been exposed to some pan-Islamic political and revivalist movements, the majority felt themselves to be Croats from Bosnia of the Muslim faith.
In the 1940s and 1950s, Bosnian Moslems came to Canada by ship and arrived for the most part in Montreal. With little money and no knowledge of English or French, they slowly dispersed throughout the country, some having been hired as farmers and farmhands as far west as British Columbia, others as miners in Yukon and northern Ontario. It was the fast-growing region of greater Toronto and southern Ontario, however, that attracted most Bosnian Muslims.
Until the early 1960s, Yugoslavia’s borders were closed, so that anyone who wished to leave the country was forced to cross illegally into neighbouring Austria or Italy. Hence, the earlier immigrants had to wait for years before wives, children, or other relatives were allowed to exit Yugoslavia. In the mid-1960s, Communist Yugoslavia changed its policies and permitted its citizens to go abroad. Hoping to supplement their incomes, many went to work for the greater part of each year in Germany, Austria, and other European countries. Canada also became a destination. Older Bosnian Muslim immigrants could now sponsor family members they had left behind just after World War II. At the same time, Bosnian Muslims working in western Europe temporarily, as well as some directly from Bosnia-Herzegovina, began to make their way to Canada.
This second group of immigrants was generally more educated than their predecessors, was secular or even atheistic in outlook, and had frequently married non-Muslim Yugoslavs. Before coming to Canada they seemed to have forgotten the animosities that deeply divided the various peoples of Yugoslavia during World War II. Feeling protected by Communist Yugoslavia’s favourable nationality policy, Bosnian Muslims became Yugoslavs par excellence. In contrast to earlier immigrants who were more critical or hostile towards Yugoslavia’s Communist regime, the post-1960s arrivals mostly respected Tito and his contribution towards the creation of a relatively peaceful and harmonious state. By the end of the 1980s, there were about 1,500 Bosnian Muslims in Canada, and among these, the older postwar generation was in the minority. Moreover, the Canadian-born children of the older group had grown up with few cultural or religious links to Bosnia or to Islam, having assimilated into the Canadian mainstream.
The Bosnian Muslim community was to change radically as a result of the collapse of an independent Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1992. Since that time, an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 refugees have arrived in Canada, fleeing the ravages of war that drove them forcibly from their homes – in a process the world came to know as “ethnic cleansing” – precisely because they were Muslims. Although most of the refugees settled in Metropolitan Toronto and other cities in southern Ontario (London, Hamilton, Kitchener), some also went to Quebec City, Montreal, and Sherbrooke in Quebec. At present, there are an estimated 10,000 Bosnian Muslims in Canada.
