In the UK, 27 police officers ended up in hospital as anti-Islamic riots broke out in Southport after three girls were stabbed to death and several other children were injured at a children's dance club in the town on Monday, writes UNN citing the BBC.
Details
Several hundred men, believed to be English radical nationalists, began pelting the local mosque and police officers who tried to stop them with stones, bottles and other objects, then set fire to a police van and garbage containers.
Sky: в английском Саутпорте после нападения с ножом на детей произошли беспорядки31.07.2024, 01:50
The local ambulance service announced at the beginning of the first hour of the morning that 22 police officers had been injured and 11 of them taken to hospital, and an hour and a half later reported that 39 police officers had been injured, of whom 27 had been taken to hospital and the rest treated on the spot. The local police itself specified that nine of its officers suffered serious injuries - fractures, cuts and contusions.
In addition, three police dogs were injured: two had paw injuries from thrown bricks and one had burns.
There were no rioters among the ambulance patients.
“The police in their statements avoid any mention of Islam and Muslims, but from the statement of a regional Islamic organization and the general context it is clear that the riots were started by people who thought that the young man arrested on charges of murders in a children's club was a Muslim and a radical Islamist,” the publication writes.
As indicated, people came to this conclusion based on reports circulating on social media. The police assure that these reports are not to be believed.
“There has been a lot of speculation and assumptions around the status of the 17-year-old who is now in police custody, and some people are using this fact to cause a disturbance on our streets. We have already stated that the arrested man was born in the UK and speculation is not helping anyone right now,” said Assistant Chief Constable Alex Goss.
The young man arrested, according to police, was born in the Welsh capital, Cardiff, and lived in the village of Banks near Southport.
The riots broke out shortly after a funeral ceremony for which Southport residents had gathered.
Police in Merseyside, a region centered on Liverpool, believe the ceremony was used as an excuse to gather and attack the mosque by radical nationalists from among supporters of the anti-Islamic English Defence League (EDL).
Former EDL leader Tommy Robinson, who lives in exile, stated in his Telegram feedthat the organization has not existed for ten years. According to open sources, the EDL has been in decline since Robinson's departure in 2013, but it has never had formal structures and membership, so it is impossible to say with certainty whether it exists or not, and in addition the police have stated “supporters” rather than members of the organization.
The Liverpool Area Mosque Network organization said via Network X that the local Muslim community had nothing to do with the killing of children in Southport. “A small minority are trying to portray the case as if this inhumane act has something to do with the Muslim community. No, it is not connected,” the mosque association said in a statement.
Those who rioted in Southport were sharply condemned by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper.
“Those who took advantage of the moment of silence for the victims and engaged in violence and thuggery have offended a grieving community,” Starmer wrote on network X and promised that the rioters ”will feel the full force of the law on themselves.
Reference
Southport is a seaside resort town 27 km north of Liverpool. It is home to about 94,500 people and only just over a thousand of them are Muslim.