Tributes pour in for British soldier slain in cleaver attack - CNN

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The victim killed in a cleaver attack Wednesday was identified as Drummer Lee Rigby of 2nd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers. The brutal killing of Rigby shocked the United Kingdom, with Prime Minister David Cameron saying the act appears to have been a terrorist attack.
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Flowers have been laid close to the scene where Rigby was killed on Friday, May 24, in London.
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A man places flowers near the scene on May 24.
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A police officer stands with flowers in a storm on Thursday, May 23, close to the crime scene in front of Woolwich Barracks in southeast London.
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A man contemplates the makeshift memorial outside Woolwich Barracks in London.
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Flowers lie outside Woolwich Barracks on May 23.
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Soldiers walk outside Woolwich Barracks on Thursday, May 23, near where the soldier was killed.
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Notes and shirts sit outside Woolwich Barracks on May 23. The slain soldier was wearing a "Help for Heroes" shirt when he was killed.
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British soldiers stand guard outside the barracks on May 23.
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Members of the far-right English Defence League wear balaclavas as they gather outside a pub in Woolwich on Wednesday, May 22.
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EDL supporters confront police in Woolwich on May 22.
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EDL leader Tommy Robinson joins supporters at the crime scene on May 22.
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A police officer guards a tent that's been set up at the crime scene as investigations continue late May 22.
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Mary Warder brings flowers to the scene of the crime on May 22 to pay respects to the victim.
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Men place flowers near the scene on John Wilson Street.
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A police officer guards a blocked-off area in Woolwich on May 22.
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A general view of Woolwich Barracks, near the scene in Woolwich.
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Police officers block off a road in Woolwich.
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Forensic officers investigate the crime scene on May 22.
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Police walk to the scene in Woolwich on May 22.
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The man in the video swore "by almighty Allah" to keep fighting. British Prime David Cameron called the attack terrorism." border="0" height="360" id="articleGalleryPhoto0021" width="640"/>A still frame from video shows a man outside the Woolwich Barracks in London holding a cleaver and addressing the camera directly, moments after a serving soldier was hacked to death in the street on Wednesday, May 22. The man in the video swore "by almighty Allah" to keep fighting. British Prime David Cameron called the attack terrorism.
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Britain's prime Minister David Cameron addresses media representatives at 10 Downing Street in London on May 23, 2013, a day after a soldier who was hacked to death in a London street by two suspected Islamist extremists.



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  • NEW: "An eye for an eye makes the world go blind," says one tribute to Lee Rigby
  • Drummer Rigby was a machine gunner and father, the UK Defense Ministry says
  • British media say Michael Adebolajo, 28, is one of two men arrested the day of the slaying
  • Two others, both 29, were arrested Thursday as part of an investigation into the slaying


Are you from the area affected, or London in general? What is your reaction to the incident? Send us your images, video and experiences.
London (CNN) -- Flowers stand in a pair of black army boots. On them is pinned a note remembering the British soldier killed in a brutal daylight slaying on a street in southeast London.
The poignant tribute is just one of many pouring in Friday for Drummer Lee Rigby, named a day earlier as the young father hit by a car, then hacked to death Wednesday by two men wielding knives and a cleaver.
Police are holding four suspects in connection with the case: those two men, hospitalized under guard after a confrontation with armed police in which they were shot, and two others arrested Thursday on suspicion of conspiracy to murder.
Friends, acquaintances and British media identified 28-year-old Michael Adebolajo, a British national of Nigerian descent, as the suspect seen in a gory video from the scene. The identities of the 22-year-old man seized with him and the two people arrested Thursday have not been released.
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Cameron: Strong indication of terrorism
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London attack suspect caught on video
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Deadly attack near London barracks
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London attack: Eyewitness heard gunshots
Since the brutal slaying, the outpouring of support for a charity that supports Britain's wounded military veterans, Help for Heroes, has been so great that its website has crashed.
Rigby, a 25-year-old machine gunner, drummer and father of a 2-year-old boy, was wearing a Help for Heroes T-shirt when he was attacked in Woolwich, according to witnesses.
Help for Heroes said Friday it had been "overwhelmed with people spontaneously showing their support for the Armed Forces" since the news broke.
"Our website is struggling to cope with this overwhelming reaction from the British public, some of whom are choosing to buy T shirts and hoodies," said a statement from the charity.
"This sudden surge of interest in the work we're doing to help the wounded and their families has taken us completely by surprise. We just want to help, and all funds we receive will be used to provide direct, practical support to those affected by their service to our country."
Tears and flowers
Many of those who laid flowers on the road near an army barracks in Woolwich where Rigby was killed were emotional as they paid tribute not just to him, but to the contribution of all British servicemen and women.
A note pinned to a bouquet says simply: "RIP Brave Soldier. Dream sweet dreams. Remembered always and never forgotten. Our thoughts with you and your family."
Another, signed by two army cadets, reads: "I understand the great lengths you would have gone to to protect our British people. It's a huge disappointment to hear the way people have treated you in your own country."
One elderly man, using a cane, had tears in his eyes as he walked, shaking his head, up and down the flowers for half an hour. He removed his hat, looked to the heavens and made the sign of the cross.
A group of teenagers came together to light tea lights for the fallen soldier.
Another woman, loudly sobbing, asked police officers standing by the growing array of tributes: "Why did this happen, why did this happen here? My children go to the school just there."
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Terrorism analyst on soldier killing
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Cell phone video of London attack scene
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Could London killing inspire other attacks?
A man sharply dressed in a suit and tie brought his toddler son to drop off flowers, each placing their blooms next to the army boots. The father took a moment to look at the boots in silence and then reached down to hug his son, tears filling his eyes.
A Nigerian woman who came to lay flowers told CNN she was angry that the media is referencing suspect Adebolajo's Nigerian roots. "He is nothing to do with Nigeria, nothing to do with us," she said, adding that the incident was "barbaric."
One note referred to both a quote by the late Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi and comments made by one of the attackers, saying: "An eye for an eye makes the world go blind."
Another had a more sinister message. Attached to a wooden cross adorned with a red poppy, the symbol of remembrance for the British armed forces, it read: "Your passing shall be avenged."
'Fast-moving investigation'
There's been no indication that Rigby knew the men who attacked him with meat cleavers Wednesday afternoon.
One of the two, who approached a man filming the gory scene in the Woolwich neighborhood, suggested that Rigby had been targeted only "because Muslims are dying daily" at the hands of British troops like him.
"We must fight them as they fight us. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," he said in the video aired by CNN affiliate ITN.
Britain's armed forces have served in Iraq and Afghanistan. All its combat troops are due to leave Afghanistan by the end of 2014.
Soldier was a machine gunner, Royal Palaces drummer, father
The two suspects detained at the scene of the killing spent Thursday in stable condition at separate South London hospitals.
Even with those two suspected attackers under guard, authorities pressed for answers, seeking to determine if others might have been somehow involved and, if so, why.
Six residences have been searched, and two people -- a man and a woman, both of them age 29 -- were arrested Thursday on "suspicion of conspiracy to murder," London's Metropolitan Police said Thursday.
"This is a large, complex and fast-moving investigation which continues to develop," added police.
The attack, which Prime Minister David Cameron and others called an act of terror, stirred anxiety and alerts in Britain not seen since the summer of 2005, when coordinated bomb attacks struck London's public transport network.
An additional 1,200 police are now on London's streets to reassure the public, Assistant Commissioner for Specialist Crime and Operations Mark Rowley said Thursday.Extra security is in place for military personnel and sites.
Abu Barra blamed Wednesday's attack not on his friend Michael Adebolajo -- who he says is the bloody, cleaver-wielding man shown talking in the ITN video -- but on the British government and predicted there may be more attacks.
"As long as (British) foreign policy is engaging in violence, they're only inviting violence in retaliation," Barra told CNN.
By sharp contrast, Cameron said "the fault lies solely with sickening individuals who carried out this attack," adding that "nothing in Islam ... justifies this truly dreadful act."
"This was not just an attack on Britain and on the British way of life; it was also a betrayal of Islam and of the Muslim communities who give so much to our country."
London attack: Terrorists targeting soldiers at home again?
Suspect knew British Muslim radical leader
It is understood that the two people suspected of carrying out the knife attack were known to Britain's domestic security service. They had featured in previous investigations into other people, but were not themselves under surveillance.
Barra said Adebolajo converted to Islam and became passionate about his faith.
British Muslim radical leader Anjem Choudary told CNN on Thursday that he knew Adebolajo, noting that the suspect attended demonstrations and a few lectures organized by Choudary's group Al-Muhajiroun.
In fact, an ITN video from April 2007 shows Adebolajo standing behind Choudary at a rally protesting the arrest of men who allegedly made inflammatory speeches inside a mosque.
Barra described his friend as a "very caring" man who "just wanted to help everybody." He was also "very vocal" about his feelings that Muslims were being oppressed, injustices he pinned, in part, on the British government.
"I wasn't surprised that it happened," Barra said of Wednesday's attack. "... Britain is only responsible, the government. And I believe all of us, as a public, we are responsible. We should condemn ourselves, why we did not do enough to stop these wars going on in Iraq and Afghanistan."
Violent reactions?
The Woolwich bloodshed spurred concerns not only about violence by Islamic extremists, but also about attacks targeting Muslims by people angered by Rigby's killing.
"People can only take so much. And people will break," said Victor Easdown, a construction worker who heard shots ring out in Woolwich as police took on Rigby's attackers.
London attack mirrors plot to behead Muslim soldier
In Kent, police arrested a man on suspicion of "racially aggravated criminal damage" at a religious building. And on Wednesday night in Essex, a man with two knives was arrested after throwing a smoke grenade at the Al Falah Braintree Islamic Center and demanding someone come outside to answer to the Woolwich slaying, the mosque's secretary Sikander Sleemy said.
Members of the far-right English Defence League clashed with police late Wednesday, with a tweet from its official account touting that "it's fair to say that finally the country is waking up!:-) NO SURRENDER!"
"Don't listen to the Government cover ups, The lies about Islam being peaceful," read another EDL tweet Thursday.
Political and social commentator Mohammed Ansar appealed for "a sense of calm (and) perspective" after what he called "a really, really heinous act of, I would say, criminality, ... not terrorism."
"What we don't need are knee-jerk reactions ... to really ratchet up tensions and really stoke and inflame anxieties within communities," he told CNN.
Watch: Terrorism analyst on soldier killing
CNN's Laura Smith-Spark reported and wrote from London, where Atika Shubert and Florence Davey-Attlee also reported. CNN's Greg Botelho, Dan Rivers, Jonathan Wald, Carol Jordan, Atika Shubert, Erin McLaughlin and Richard Allen Greene contributed to this report.

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