BBC Radio News are reporting at least one death after rioting broke out in the Lozells area of Birmingham tonight, following a meeting held to protest against an alleged sexual assault on an illegal immigrant. Last week protesters in nearby Perry Barr stopped traffic in protest at the assault.
After all, it's not as if Brum has any other major problems to protest about.
More updates when I can tune into BRMB.
UPDATE 10.20 pm - Radio Five have live coverage and the local MP in the studio - the causes seem to be obscure, but the hundred-plus guys in hoodies with baseball bats, attacking motorists and looting shops are pretty real. Apparently the allegd attack took place in a shop. Which according to the studio guests is one of a chain. Which again according to those guests has been seen by some members of "the community" as unfairly competing with "community-owned" businesses. I'll take a guess at the ethnicity of the chain's owners.
I get a bit of a "Freddy's Fashion Mart" feeling about all this. And I remember the Asian family, now totally forgotten, who were burned alive in their post office during the 1985 Handsworth riots. If the police or white racists had killed them they'd have schools and streets named after them.
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10 hours ago