UK Rioters were from Ethiopia and Other 43 countries

Thieves and vandals convicted of causing millions of pounds worth of damage during the disorder came from as far afield as Iraq, Jamaica, Poland and Ethiopia.

The details of the nationalities of those jailed will provide further weight to claims the riots had little to do with political protest but instead represented opportunist criminality.

Newly released prison statistics show that 14 per cent – roughly one in seven – of those jailed for robbery, theft, criminal damage, burglary and disorder during the riots were born abroad. The true number could be even higher as at least four per cent of those remanded in custody refused to reveal their nationality.

Yesterday, prison data recorded by the Ministry of Justice provided a detailed breakdown of the nationalities of those jailed for riot-related offences committed between August 6, when the trouble exploded in Tottenham, north London, and August 9, when disorder had spread outside of the capital.

By September 9, after hundreds of rioters had been arrested, figures show there were 153 foreign nationals and prisoners of ‘unrecorded nationality’ – which in most cases refers to those from the European Union – in UK jails, representing 18 per cent of the 865 criminals imprisoned over the riots. That compares with 712 offenders from Britain.

Rioters from Jamaica represented the largest group of foreign inmates, followed by Somali and Polish offenders. The list also included those from Colombia, Iraq, Congo, Vietnam and Zimbabwe.

One in four of those jailed for robbery were born abroad, as were one in ten convicted for violent disorder or other disorder offences such as possession of a knife or drugs. Nationally, police forces have made more than 4,000 arrests, with 2,952 suspects held in London.

Yesterday, Sir Andrew Green of the MigrationWatch pressure group called on the Government to ensure foreign rioters were expelled from the country.

He told the Daily Mail: “It’s absolutely unacceptable that any foreign citizen should take part in a riot in Britain.

“It’s important that the courts should recommend deportation in every case which would qualify.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk