Violent clashes between right-wing protesters and police have marred multiple cities across the UK as anti-immigration demonstrations took place following the murder of three children by a teenager of African descent earlier this week. The protests turned violent in Liverpool, Nottingham, Leeds, Belfast, Stoke-on-Trent, Blackpool, and Hull, with more than 30 such incidents occurring on Saturday night alone.
The demonstrations were sparked by the murder of three children and the wounding of ten others in Southport last week, allegedly at the hands of 17-year-old Axel Rudakubana, who was born in Britain to Rwandan parents. The riots in Southport spread across England, resulting in over a hundred arrests in London on Wednesday and a police station set alight in Sunderland on Friday.
Protesters and rioters shouted anti-immigration and anti-Islam slogans, despite the fact that Rudakubana is not a Muslim. Tensions between Muslim immigrants and native British have been simmering in northern England since it was revealed that police had covered up the existence of multiple Muslim ‘grooming gangs’ in the region over the last two decades.
In Leeds, where seven Muslim men were given prison sentences in April for raping eight British girls, demonstrators chanted “pedo Muslims off our streets” and “save our kids.” Police officers kept the protesters separate from a group of pro-immigrant left-wingers who turned up to stage a counter-demonstration.
In Manchester, fighting broke out between left- and right-wing protesters, with the right-wing side hurling fences and other debris at police officers attempting to separate the groups. Demonstrators outraged over the murder of three girls in Southport clashed with police and counter-protestors in Manchester, as part of a series of protests taking place across the United Kingdom. Brits are calling for an end to mass migration.
Police and protesters also clashed in Liverpool, with two officers hospitalized after being pelted with bricks and other projectiles. In Bristol, police were unable to prevent sporadic clashes between left- and right-wing groups. Video footage from Stoke purportedly showed gangs of Muslim men marching with machetes and other weapons.
In a speech to the nation on Thursday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer focused almost entirely on the reaction to Monday’s stabbings, rather than the stabbings themselves. Starmer condemned the “far-right hatred” fueling the riots, and vowed to give police additional powers to tackle similar unrest in the future. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper warned on Saturday that additional prosecutors and prison spaces had been prepared, and that anyone involved in “criminal violence and disorder” would “pay the price.