This Article is From Aug 10, 2011

Britain riots: London Mayor heckled

Britain riots: London Mayor heckled
London: London Mayor Boris Johnson was confronted by angry locals during a visit to Clapham in south London, one of the areas badly hit by Tuesday's violence and looting.

Johnson was bombarded with questions about the police response to the unrest.

Despite assuring the public that more police would be on the street on Tuesday night, many felt that it came too late.

"Why are you here now? You're here too late. Why are you here now?" asked one person.

"At five o'clock, we knew they were going to hit, and no one was here. I was in the salon when a brick came through the wall, through the window, and no one was here to defend me," said another.

Johnson had gone to Clapham to thank locals for volunteering to clear up, but many locals were still angry at the police response to the violence.

Shopkeepers in particular were furious at both the rioters and at the fact that the police had been unable to stop the damage to their property.

British Prime Minister David Cameron recalled Parliament from its summer recess on Tuesday and nearly tripled the number of police on the streets.

Violence first broke out in London late on Saturday in the low-income, multiethnic northern district of Tottenham, where protesters demonstrated against the fatal police shooting of Mark Duggan, a 29-year-old father of four who was gunned down in disputed circumstances on Thursday.

Duggan's death stirred old animosities and racial tensions similar to those that prompted massive UK race riots in the 1980s, despite efforts by London police to build better relations with the city's ethnic communities.

Some 525 arrests have been made in London alone and dozens were arrested in other cities.


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