Race tension runs high after London riot

Scotland Yard yesterday said "reasonable force" would be used against rioters and looters if they posed a danger.

But the sudden rise in communities taking matters into their own hands has helped mobilise right-wing extremists from the English Defence League.

Meanwhile, a man has been arrested over the mugging of young Malaysian student Asyraf Haziq Rosli by a group of youths who pretended to help him after he suffered a broken jaw.

Footage of his ordeal has been watched by millions after being posted on YouTube.

There was little trouble on Wednesday night as thousands of police patrolled the streets in every big city across the country.

But racial tensions were high in Birmingham after three young men were killed in a hit-and-run while protecting a friend's carwash business from looters.

Shazad Ali, 30, (center) his brother, Abdul Musavir, 31, (right) and Haroon Jahan, 21, (left) were standing on a footpath with about 80 Asians when a high-performance car allegedly driven by Afro-Caribbean men wearing balaclavas drove into them at high speed.

Witnesses said bricks and sticks were thrown at the car moments before it accelerated at the group.

Police found the car on fire an hour later and a 32-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of murder.

Tariq Jahan, father of Haroon, yesterday pleaded with angry crowds of Asian men "to stand united".

"Blacks, Asians, whites - we all live in the same community - why do we have to kill one another?" Mr Jahan said. "Step forward if you want to lose your sons, otherwise calm down and go home, please."

West Midlands police chief Chris Sims said he wanted to ensure the deaths did not lead to "a much wider" level of distrust.

But as the first looters appeared in court yesterday it was clear there was no one racial or ethnic group responsible for the looting and violence that has rocked Britain.

Among the hundreds of rioters who clogged up London's courts was primary school classroom assistant Alexis Baily, 31, who broke into a hi-fi store in Croydon, South London.

An 11-year-old boy, thought to be the youngest person arrested in the chaos, was dragged into court by his furious mother after he stole an $80 bin from Debenhams in North London.

British Prime Minister David Cameron has unveiled new measures to end the riots, and admitted he had considered ordering the army to quell the violence.

Mr Cameron told an emergency session of parliament last night (Melbourne time) that he had given police extra powers, including the ability to order youths to remove face coverings.

Mr Cameron said anyone whose property was damaged in the riots in London and other cities, during which dozens of buildings have been torched and four people killed, would be compensated.

"We will not let a violent few beat us," he told MPs.

"We need to show the world, which has looked on frankly appalled, that the perpetrators of the violence we have seen on our streets are not in any way representative of our country - nor of our young people."

He also said that a year before London hosts the 2012 Olympics Britain needed to show a more positive face to the world.

Mr Cameron, who cut short his holiday to deal with the crisis, said initially that "simply far too few police were deployed onto the streets", adding that police had treated it as a public order situation instead of criminality.

But he admitted for the first time that he and senior security officials had discussed calling out the military to help, and had raised the possibility of a curfew.

"It is my responsibility to make sure that every contingency is looked at - including whether there are tasks that the army could undertake that would free up more police for the front line," he said.

Those included "some simple guarding tasks" but added this was "not for today, it is not even for tomorrow, it is just so you have contingency plans in case it becomes necessary."

He reiterated that police had been given powers to use water cannon and plastic bullets.

Many of the outbreaks of disorder were believed to have been co-ordinated using the internet and mobile phones.

Mr Cameron said steps were being considered to ban those suspected of planning criminal acts from using social media.

He said: "We are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality."

The riots started on Saturday, sparked by anger over the shooting by police of a 29-year-old man, Mark Duggan, in the deprived north London district of Tottenham.

Mr Cameron, whose Conservative-led coalition government is bringing in tough spending cuts, also dismissed claims that poverty had contributed to the unrest, saying it was "not about politics or protest, it is about theft".

- Herald Sun