London
UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has hit out at people “trying to interfere in our democracy” after US Vice President JD Vance waded right into a nationwide controversy by blaming “mass migration” for the latest murder of a student.
The killing of Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old White scholar, sparked a nationwide outcry after it emerged that police officers had handcuffed him as he lay dying from stab wounds inflicted by Vickrum Digwa, a 23-year-old Sikh man, in an assault late final 12 months.
Digwa, who at the time falsely claimed to police that he had been the sufferer of a racist assault, has since been convicted of homicide and sentenced to life in jail, however the case has been co-opted by the far-right to accuse British establishments together with the police of being biased in opposition to White Britons.
Vance joined the talk on Friday, pointing to the failure to cease the “flow of mass migration” as the rationale for Nowak’s death.
The scholar would nonetheless be alive, Vance wrote in a put up on X, if “the last few generations of European elites had stood their ground against the politics of self-hatred and the mass invasion of migrants.”
Soon after Vance’s remark a spokesperson for Starmer warned in opposition to people who’re “trying to interfere in our democracy and seeking to stir up division on our streets.”
The Downing Street assertion, which didn’t point out Vance straight, continued, “The Nowak family are grieving after Henry’s horrific murder. They have said they do not want his death to be used to create further division, hatred or tension. We should be respecting their wishes.”
The change got here a day after the US Department of State despatched condolences to Nowak’s household in a put up on X, in which it appeared to recommend “two-tiered policing” had performed a job in the incident, echoing a key speaking level amongst right-wing figures that claims law enforcement officials have grow to be so afraid of being accused of racism that ethnic minorities are given better safety.
“Ideological conditioning and two-tiered policing are glaring symptoms of civilizational decline. They must be rejected across the West,” it stated.
Downing Street pushed again on the declare, with the Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy saying “mistakes can happen in any public service,” that investigations are rightly ongoing and that the “system is working.”
“We don’t recognise the characterisation of two-tiered policing,” he stated.
Nowak, a freshman finance scholar, was touring residence from an evening out together with his pals when he was killed on December 3, 2025. Digwa stabbed him 5 instances, inflicting important inner bleeding from a chest wound, native police stated in a statement.
Responding to the incident, police positioned Nowak in handcuffs after falsely being informed by Digwa he had been the sufferer of a racist assault. In upsetting bodycam footage launched by Hampshire Police, Nowak pleaded with officers, saying, “I can’t breathe” and “I’ve been stabbed.” An officer replied, “I don’t think you have, mate.”