North London Is Burning

I love a good riot. I think they make more compelling television than normal news. If this feed is still working, you can watch the live happenings on Sky News.

So what happened? What has caused the people to strike back at the police and now the media? Well, a young man was killed by the police earlier today. The Sun provides some nice background information:

Suspected gangster Mark Duggan, 29, fired a handgun at an armed cop, whose life was saved when the bullet hit his radio.

The officer returned fire with his Heckler & Koch MP5 sub-machine gun - blasting dad-of-five Duggan twice in the face before slumping to the ground.

There's more information about why he was being followed in that article.

It started off as a peaceful protest:

"It wasn't like this before," said one woman standing close to one of the two burned-out police cars. "It started out as a peaceful demonstration. The police shot a guy here last week and they lied about what happened. They said he pulled a gun but he wouldn't have done that with armed police. They shot him so badly that his mother could not recognise him."

But has exploded into a full out riot. There's a double decker bus on fire. It's a quite unbelievable sight.

Hails of bottles and bricks were intermittently thrown at police from side streets as reinforcements arrived. Rioters also aimed fireworks at police. At one stage, four firework rockets were shot at a line of horses, prompting a charge and a nearby crowd to disperse in panic.

Needless to say, I'll be watching Sky News for the rest of the evening.