British Government Wants Anti-Extremism Strategy After Riot Arrests

Around 1,280 people were arrested following riots in the UK over the summer, British Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said today, promising a strategy to combat extremism.

According to the minister, of those arrested, more than 570 were taken to court for offences such as violent disorder, assaulting police officers, arson and encouraging violent attacks on the Internet. 

 

Dozens of defendants were sentenced to prison, fines and other penalties. 

‘This robust and swift response by the government and the criminal justice system was a strong deterrent and demonstrated our firm determination to keep people safe and, most importantly, order has been restored,’ he told MPs during a speech on the first day after the parliamentary recess.

The unrest in the UK was sparked by a deadly knife attack that killed three children, including a Portuguese woman, on 29 July in Southport (north-west England).

The police arrested the suspect in the attack, a young man about whom rumours circulated on social media, later denied, that he was an asylum seeker or a Muslim immigrant.

The authorities later clarified that the young man is from Wales and the son of Rwandan parents.

Nevertheless, in the following days, and in different parts of the country, groups of people attacked shops, a library and community centre, a mosque and a hotel used as asylum accommodation was set on fire with people inside in Southport. 

Some people were also attacked in the street for being immigrants.

Dozens of police officers were injured by thrown bottles and bricks and in clashes with anti-immigration protesters, allegedly instigated by far-right activists. 

‘This disgraceful disorder and racist hatred, including that incited by a hateful minority on the internet, was an insult to those who are mourning Southport. So let's be very clear: these violent and criminal attacks were not protests. They were not demands. They were acts of violence, racism and crime,’ said Cooper.

As well as promising thousands more police officers on the streets, the minister ordered a rapid review of the strategy to combat extremism, be it Islamist or far-right. 

Cooper also argued that technology companies with social networks should take ‘responsibility for the poison proliferated on their platforms’ and that ‘criminal content on the Internet should result in criminal sanctions’.