POLICE and council leaders have called an emergency meeting for today.

It will also bring together community leaders to discuss recent events, their causes and ways of resolving the tensions and resulting violence throughout the area.

Councillor Rafique Malik, Burnley's first Asian mayor and prominent member of the Asian community, said: "I think the meeting will service three purposes.

"People would be informed what has happened, realise how difficult a job it was for police and how difficult it was for the young children watching.

"And people will listen to the views of those who have to say anything and bring life back to normality.

"My information is that people involved are known to the town, the police and communities. They are very violent people not normal people and that is the point.

"Violence breeds violence, it does not cure it.

"This is very depressing as we have had very good race relations so far and a few people trying to take the law into their own hands must realise they are doing major damage to the reputation of the town."

Burnley has a population of around 92,000, including 6,000 people from ethnic minorities, mainly Pakistanis and Bangladeshis.