Imam Syed Soharwardy pauses while talking to his fellow Muslims during a show for support against the attacks on Canadian soldiers
IN PHOTO: Imam Syed Soharwardy pauses while talking to his fellow Muslims during a show for support against the attacks on Canadian soldiers during their memorial service in Calgary, Alberta, October 24, 2014. The Muslims Against Terrorism and Islamic Supreme Council of Canada were holding a memorial service for the two Canadian soldiers killed this past week. Reuters/Todd Korol

A Canadian woman publicly criticised the radicalisation of her own son. The Ottawa mother is the founder of the National Islamic Sisters' Association of Canada.

Michelle Walrond, who is a Muslim by faith, said that she had been fighting against the extremists in Ottawa for around two decades as they had influenced her son Luqman Abdunnur to believe in radical Islam. According to Walrond, a group of people promoted Wahhabism, an extremely conservative Saudi form of Islam, to her son. Abdunnur was arrested last October after he had allegedly refused to show his hands to police at a traffic stop. He apparently pushed a police officer and tried running away from the scene. He was eventually subdued with a Taser. An OPP officer fired his gun during the incident though the bullet did not hit anybody.

The 39-year-old man is presently kept at the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre. He is charged for obstructing and assaulting a police officer. Abdunnur first grabbed attention of national security officers after he had hailed the murder of Cpl. Nathan Cirillo as a heroic act. Witnesses said that Abdunnur had stood up in the Assunnah mosque and criticised an imam for condemning the killing of Cirillo. He said that the gunman who had killed the soldier should have been called a hero. Police were informed about the incident.

Ottawa Citizen quoted Walrond saying that her son did get influenced by the extremists. She said that her son was judging people on whether they were following the right kind of Islam or not. He apparently assumed that he had the right to excommunicate other people, she said. She also said that those extremists should be held accountable for what they had taught and what they continued to promote. According to Walrond, fighting extremism is all she can do to help at the moment. "I'm a mom, and if you know mothers, they will throw themselves in front of moving cars to save their kids. That's just what we do," she said.

Walrond's son has been reportedly involved in a polygamous marriage with a couple of women. He is the father of more than 14 children as well.

Contact the writer: s.mukhopadhyay@ibtimes.com.au