A woman who was verbally assaulted and pushed into the canal by a gang of youths two years ago has said she has forgiven the perpetrators.

Shelly Xiong said this was not the first time she'd been victim to a  "racially motivated" attack.

Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast, Xiong said that forgiveness and justice can coexist in the aftermath of such incidents.

"Forgiveness does not mean that I tolerate this kind of behavior, whether it's humiliation or it's violence, I don't tolerate, or I don't accept it."

"If I experienced or if I see these, I will still expose [the perpetrators] and bring them to justice", she said.

"I believe that if we tolerate or accept those behaviors, we were encouraging them and that shouldn't be encouraged and they should be brought to the justice system and to receive the legal consequence."

"But on the other hand, I say forgive is my personal decision."

The attack

The attack on Ms Xiong occurred by Dublin's Royal Canal while she was out for a walk.

A group of young teenagers began circling her on bikes and shouting "racist abuse", including narratives about the COVID-19 virus.

"I told them 'that's racial discriminative and that's wrong' and as I was challenging them they pushed me."

"I can swim, but I was very frightened because as I said, I did not realise that was coming and I actually couldn't recollect that part of the memory", Ms Xiong explained.

"It was later some friends sent me the video and I looked at the video it was like watching a horror movie."

Trauma

Ms Xiong said that after the attack it took her a while to recover from the trauma caused.

"It was humiliating from the very beginning because I was having a peaceful walk."

"I was very frightened and very traumatised, for I have this habit of really daily exercising - walking or jogging - but I couldn't really go out for a long walk, or jog on my own for a long time [after the incident]", she explained.