2011-08-11 09:51

Police officers in riot gear are deployed in Eltham, south London August 10, 2011. [Photo/Agencies]

"Broken society"

After being accused of a sluggish response, Cameron has ordered parliament to reconvene on Thursday, disrupting his own summer holiday and the parliamentary summer recess.

He made no reference to social and economic problems in inner-city areas. The initial trouble flared after an Afro-Caribbean man died from a gunshot wound after an incident involving armed police in London.

"There are pockets of our society that are not just broken but frankly sick," said Cameron, who has made fixing "broken Britain" a cornerstone of his premiership.

Courts worked through the night on Wednesday to process riot cases. Among the defendants were an 11-year old boy, a charity worker and a teaching assistant. More than 1,000 arrests had been made, with 805 in London alone.

Vigilantes

In Birmingham, police launched a murder inquiry after three Muslim men died after being run over by a car in the mayhem there. The men had been part of a group of British Asians protecting their area from looters.  

The violence has appalled many Britons, who have been transfixed by images of rioters attacking individuals and raiding family-owned stores as well as targeting big business.

It has also prompted soul-searching.  

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.

"This disturbing phenomenon has to be understood as a conflagration of aggression from a socially and economically excluded underclass," the liberal Independent newspaper said.  

The right-wing Daily Telegraph took a harder line.  

"The thugs must be taught to respect the law the hard way. These riots have shamed the nation and the government must be held to account."