Youths rampage in British city on fourth night of riots

Hundreds of masked youths rampaged through the centre of Manchester on Tuesday, smashing windows and going on a looting spree as the worst riots for decades in Britain spread to a new city on a fourth night of violence.

Violence erupted in Manchester, northwest England, for the first time since the riots began, with a huge group of youths locked in running battles with hundreds of riot police in the city centre.

The youths smashed shop windows and went on a looting spree, setting fire to shops and hurling missiles at police.

There were also serious outbreaks of violence in Birmingham and other parts of central England, but London – which had borne the brunt of previous violence – was largely quiet after thousands of extra police were ordered onto the streets.

The worst-hit was Manchester, however, where police were driven back by gangs of hundreds of youths who covered their faces with scarves and ski masks.

Gangs smashed into shoe shops, electronics shops and clothes stores and set fire to a girls’ clothing store in the city centre.

Two raiders smashed the glass entrance of a shopping centre, opening the way for around 100 youths to pour into a shop before rushing out carrying clothing and shoes.

Gangs taunted the police, hurling stones and missiles at shop windows and jeering riot officers as they chased them. Riot police in vans chased groups of masked youths around the city.

One resident told the BBC that looting had gone on “for hours” in Manchester after riot police “were driven back” by youths.

Earlier, hundreds of youths were involved in a stand-off with riot police several miles away at a shopping centre in the Salford area of the city, where looting also broke out.

Prime Minister David Cameron recalled Parliament yesterday and ordered thousands of extra police onto the streets after Britain’s worst rioting in decades left parts of London and other cities in flames.

As the disorder claimed its first fatality with the death of a man found shot during looting in south London, Mr Cameron vowed to do “everything necessary to restore order to the streets” after three nights of violence.

The Prime Minister cut short his holiday in Italy to return to Britain for an emergency meeting on the riots, which he condemned as “sickening scenes”.

Police have begun releasing CCTV pictures of the looters, many of them in their teens. Some 525 people have been arrested in London in the last three days, Scotland Yard said.

In Birmingham, police said they were dealing with “a large group of people causing disorder in several areas within the city centre.

“There have been some shops attacked, and there is also a report of a car having been set alight,” a statement said.

In the industrial town of West Bromwich, near Birmingham, a 200-strong gang hurled missiles at police in riot gear, set vehicles alight and smashed up shops.

Violence also erupted in the nearby city of Wolverhampton, where youths broke into shops, according to police.

Mr Cameron warned: “You will feel the full force of the law. And if you are old enough to commit these crimes, you are old enough to face the punishments.”

He said that all police leave had been cancelled and there would be 16,000 officers on the streets of London yesterday night, compared to the 6,000 deployed on Monday evening.

The family of the dead man, Mark Duggan, condemned the violence yesterday, saying in a statement that they were “deeply distressed” by the unrest, which they insisted “has nothing to do with finding out what has happened to Mark”.

Scotland Yard Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stephen Kavanagh said the rampage by hundreds of hooded youths overnight was “unprecedented” and said police resources were stretched “to an extent I have never seen before”.

He said that plastic bullets – used during sectarian unrest in Northern Ireland but never before in mainland Britain – have been considered as “one of the tactics” to stem the tide of unrest.

Police have also urged parents to keep their children at home.

They said too many people had been arrested to hold in the city’s police station jails, including three for attempted murder after a police officer was hit by a car in Brent, northwest London.

At least 44 police officers were injured overnight on Monday, in addition to at least 35 who were hurt on the previous two evenings, police said.