
© REUTERS/Hannah McKayLondon police
Knife crime in England and Wales rose to its highest level since comparable statistics began to be gathered nine years ago, with London reporting
a 28% annual rise in knife killings over the past year.Offences involving knives or sharp instruments in England and Wales
rose 6% to 46,265 in the year to March 2020, 51% higher than when comparable figures began in 2011, according to police data published on Friday by Britain's Office for National Statistics.
London, which accounted for just over a third of knife crime, saw a 7% rise in offences.
"The number of homicides involving the use of a knife or sharp instrument in London increased from 67 to 86, a 28% increase," the ONS said.
While knife crime rose, there was a 4% decrease in firearms offences and a 9% decrease in burglary across England and Wales. Data for the city of Manchester in northwest England was excluded due to problems with a new computer system in the city.
The increase in knife crime recorded by the police
contrasts with a longer-term decline in violent crime measured by an ONS survey of the public, which is its lowest since that survey began in 1981 and more than 70% below its peak in 1995.
Comment: An eyewitness who lives near the cathedral told the LCI news outlet that he was woken up by "a very strange sound of bells" and he could see the fire from his home.
Also this week there was a stabbing at church in Virginia, US, and just a few days earlier another church in the US was vandalized with satanic and anarchist symbols.
Update 18 July 2020
Further reports and photos show that the fire indeed started in several places: Update 19 July 2020
A 39-year-old Rwandan man, who worked for the diocese as a volunteer, is a suspect, according to the Europe1 news outlet - and he has been taken into custody.
Breitbart adds: It sounds like they're dangling this man as a fall-guy, for now, in order to gaslight the population into privately thinking "I knew it had to be a foreigner," while, of course, it probably wasn't him - though he may have unwittingly allowed the actual perpetrators to sneak in and do their wicked deed.