London-Bersih similarity: Pakatan slams cop for non-intelligent comparison

Community leaders said the violence in London, the worst for decades in the multi-ethnic capital of 7.8 million people, was rooted in growing disparities in wealth and opportunity.

Many Londoners have been stunned by the looting in which gangs ransacked shops, carting off clothes, shoes and electronic goods, torched cars and defied the police.

But after the first three nights, London alone saw just 450 arrests, and arrests nationwide have just breached 1,000 after five days despite police launching a murder inquiry after three Muslim men were run over by a car in Birmingham.

In Malaysia, opposition leaders and human rights activists have accused police of using excessive force to clamp down on the Bersih march for free and fair elections, claiming that police fired tear gas directly at demonstrators, acts they termed “attempted murder.”

The electoral reform movement had initially accepted the Najib administration’s offer to move its street rally to a stadium but it was denied its choice of Stadium Merdeka.

The coalition of 62 NGOs took to the streets to march to the historic venue anyway, defying warnings of police action, which finally resulted in nearly 1,700 arrests, scores injured and one ex-soldier dead.

The London riots are said to have sparked off after last week’s fatal shooting of Mark Duggan, said by some to have had his “head blown off” by a police sharpshooter despite not opening fire at officers.

Since then, violent clashes between groups of young people and the police have dominated the British domestic news. The clashes were soon followed by the looting of shops as well as the torching of vehicles and buildings, and lately a few attacks on civilians have also been reported.

- Malaysian Insider