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New initiative launched to fight UK knife crime

Britons convicted of carrying knives will be made to visit hospital emergency wards in an attempt to confront them with the reality of stab wounds, British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said on Sunday.

  • Reuters
  • Published: 23:41 July 13, 2008
  • Gulf News

London: Britons convicted of carrying knives will be made to visit hospital emergency wards in an attempt to confront them with the reality of stab wounds, British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith said on Sunday.

Convicted knife carriers will also have to meet families of knife crime victims and people imprisoned for knife crime, in a package of measures Smith unveiled in response to a spate of stabbing fatalities last week.

"I'm very keen we make people to face up to the consequences of their actions," Smith told Sky Television. "It's a practical and tough approach to make young people understand the implications of carrying a knife."

The measures were announced as violent knife crime has been catapulted to the forefront of the political agenda. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has pledged to announce new crime-fighting initiatives this week.

Four fatal stabbings in a single day in London on Thursday brought the total killed with knives in the capital this year above 50. Police say knife crime is their biggest priority, although they denied it had become an "epidemic".

Violence in the London became an international issue after the frenzied stabbings of two French students in London on June 29, an incident police called one of the grisliest cases they had seen. A second man was charged on Saturday with the murders.

The problem is not just confined to London. Yesterday, Greater Manchester Police launched a murder probe after the death of a man in his 30s with stab wounds. A 19-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of murder in the case.

Police say London is still safe for a city of its size, and that the overall murder rate has not risen substantially. In the year ending this May there were 162 murders.

There were 155 the previous year, and 210 five years ago. Tomorrow the government is due to unveil its £100 million (Dh731 million) Youth Crime Action Plan.

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