King Charles III To Visit Southport Three Weeks After Knife Attack

King Charles III will on Tuesday visit Southport in northwest England, Buckingham Palace announced, three weeks after a knife attack which killed three young girls sparked nationwide riots.

“His Majesty The King will travel to Southport to express his continued support for those affected by the 29th July attack and the riot which followed in the town, and to thank frontline emergency staff for their ongoing work serving local people,” the palace said in a statement.

The monarch will meet members of the Southport community outside the town hall early in the afternoon, before then meeting regional leaders, representatives from the emergency services and others. They will include local groups and faith leaders impacted by the violent disorder which hit Southport the day after the July 29 mass stabbing.

Ahead of those public engagements, Charles will meet privately with some of those impacted by the knife attack, which claimed the lives of three young girls and injured 10 others, including eight children. The meeting will include some of the surviving children who were present at the community centre targeted, as well as their families.

The children were attending a Taylor Swift-themed dance class when an assailant entered the building and began attacking them. Axel Rudakubana, who was aged 17 at the time, has been charged with murder and attempted murder over the stabbing spree.

A motive for the atrocity has not been disclosed, but police have said it is not being treated as terrorism-related. More than a dozen English towns and cities saw unrest and riots in the week that followed the events in Southport.

Officials have blamed far-right elements for helping to stir up the disorder, which targeted mosques and hotels housing asylum seekers as well as police officers and other properties.

The authorities have cited misinformation spread online that Rudakubana was a Muslim asylum seeker for fuelling the violence. He was actually born in Britain to parents who hail from Rwanda, an overwhelmingly Christian country.