UK authorities faced growing pressure on August 4, 2024, to put an end to the England’s worst rioting in 13 years after disturbances linked to child murders and involving anti-immigrant agitators flared across the country. Unrest related to misinformation about a mass stabbing that killed three young girls last week spread to multiple towns and cities on August 3, 2024 as anti-immigration demonstrators clashed with police.
The violence is posing a serious threat to Prime Minister Keir Starmer who was elected only a month ago after leading the Labour Party to a landslide win over the Conservatives. About 90 people were arrested after skirmishes broke out at anti-immigrant rallies in numerous places such as Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol, Blackpool and Hull as well as Belfast in Northern Ireland.
In some instances, rioters threw bricks, bottles and flares at the police and injured several officers, looted and burnt shops while demonstrators shouted anti-Islamic slurs as they clashed with the counter-protestors. The violence is worst that England has seen since the summer of 2011, when widespread rioting took place following the police’s killing of a mixed man in North London.
“We have had riots and clashes of this nature, but they have been pocketed in particular areas of the country. We are now seeing flooding across major cities and towns,” said Tiffany Lynch of the Police Federation of England and Wales. The government said the police have all the resources they need to deal with the disorders as officers warned of more demonstrations on August 3, 2024, leading to the fears that the unrest can spread again.
Forces have drafted in extra officers while Justice Minister Shabana Mahmood has insisted that “the whole justice system is ready to deliver convictions as quickly as possible.” The government’s policing minister Diana Johnson told an international media agency that the rioting will not be tolerated vowing penalties and consequences for the disorder.
The skirmishes on August 3, 2024 marked the fourth day of the unrest in several towns and cities followed on August 4, 2024 frenzied knife attack In Southport, near Liverpool on England’s northwestern coasts. Protests were also fuelled on social media about the background of the British born 17-year-old suspect Axel Rudakubana was charged by several counts of murders and attempted murders over the attack at a Taylor Swift themed dance party.
Rudakubana is accused of killing Bebe King, Elis Dot Stancombe, Alice Dasilva Aguiar and other ten people. Police have blamed the violence on supporters and associated organizers of the English Defence League an anti-Islam organisation founded 15 years ago whose supporters have been linked to football hooliganism. Agitators have targeted mosques, in Southport and in the northeastern English city of Sunderland, leading to hundreds of Islamic centres to bolster security amid fears for its worshipper’s safety.
The rallies have been advertised on social media under the banner “Enough is Enough.” They have seen protestors waving English and British flags while chanting slogans like “Stop the Boats”, a reference to irregular migrants travelling to Britain and France. Anti-fascist demonstrators held counter rallies in many cities including Leeds where they shouted “Nazi Scum Off Our Streets” as the anti-immigrant protestors chanted “You are not English” anymore.
Not all of August 3, 2024 estimated thirty gatherings turned violent and some participants claimed to have legitimate grievances. “People are fed-up with being told you should be ashamed if you are white and working class, but I am proud working class,” 41-year-old Karina who did not give her surname,” an international media agency reported.
Commentators have suggested that the demonstrators spurred on by online influencers may feel emboldened by the political ascendancy of anti-immigration elements in British politics. At last month’s elections, the Reform Party captured fourteen percent of the vote, one of the largest vote shares for a British party.
Starmer has accused thugs of hijacking the nations grief to sow hatred and has announced that new measures to allow sharing of intelligence, wider deployment of facial recognition technology and criminal behaviour orders to restrict troublemakers from travelling. Policing minister Johnson said the government will do whatever it takes to ensure people are brought to justice, including the possibility of courts sitting overnight as they did during the 2011 UK riots.
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