•Man, 52, arrested

•EU referendum campaigns suspended

A British female lawmaker was shot dead in the street in northern England yesterday, causing deep shock across Britain and the suspension of campaigning for next week’s referendum on the country’s European Union membership.
Jo Cox, 41, a lawmaker for the opposition Labour Party and vocal supporter of Britain remaining in the European Union, was attacked as she prepared to hold a meeting with constituents in Birstall near Leeds.
Media reports said she had been shot and stabbed. The Labour MP for Batley and Spen, was left bleeding on the ground by her attacker. West Yorkshire Police said a 52-year-old man was arrested by officers nearby and weapons including a firearm recovered. The motive for the attack was not known as at press time.
Mrs Cox is the first sitting MP to be killed since 1990, when Ian Gow was the last in a string of politicians to die at the hands of Northern Irish terror groups. Cafe owner Clarke Rothwell, who witnessed the attack, said he heard a “loud popping noise that sounded like a balloon burst, a loud balloon”. “When I looked round there’s a man stood there in his 50s with a white baseball cap on and a jacket with a gun, an old fashioned looking gun in his hand,” he said.
“He shot this lady once and then he shot her again, he fell to the floor, leant over shot her once more in the face area. Somebody tried to grab him, wrestling with him and then he wielded a knife, like a hunting knife, just started lunging at her with a knife half a dozen times. People were screaming and running from the area”.
Eyewitness Hithem Ben Abdallah, said the mother of two was left lying and bleeding on the pavement after the incident.
Mr Abdallah, 56, was in a cafe next door to the library shortly after 13:00 BST when he heard screaming and went outside.
“There was a guy who was being very brave and another guy with a white baseball cap who he was trying to control and the man in the baseball cap suddenly pulled a gun from his bag”. After a brief scuffle, he said the man stepped back and the MP became involved.
Mr Abdallah said the weapon had “looked handmade” and a man who had been wrestling with the gunman continued even after seeing the gun. He said: “The man stepped back with the gun and fired it and then he fired a second shot, as he was firing he was looking down at the ground.”
“He was kicking her as she was lying on the floor”, he said. Her husband Brendan issued a statement upon learning of her death.
The statement attracted emotional responses from many MPs: “Today is the beginning of a new chapter in our lives. More difficult, more painful, less joyful, less full of love. I and Jo’s friends and family are going to work every moment of our lives to love and nurture our kids and to fight against the hate that killed Jo.
“Jo believed in a better world and she fought for it everyday of her life with an energy, and a zest for life that would exhaust most people. She would have wanted two things above all else to happen now, one that our precious children are bathed in love and two, that we all unite to fight against the hatred that killed her.
Hate doesn’t have a creed, race or religion, it is poisonous. Jo would have no regrets about her life, she lived every day of it to the full.”
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said in a statement: “The whole of the Labour Party and Labour family and indeed the whole country will be in shock at the horrific murder of Jo Cox today.”
Prime Minister David Cameron said the killing of Cox, who was married with two children and had worked on United States President Barack Obama’s 2008 election campaign, was a tragedy.
“We have lost a great star,” the Conservative prime minister said in a statement. “She was a great campaigning MP with huge compassion, with a big heart. It is dreadful, dreadful news.”
British lawmakers are not in parliament ahead of the June 23 referendum on whether Britain should remain in the EU.
The rival referendum campaign groups suspended activities for the day and Cameron said pulled out of a planned rally in Gibraltar, the British territory on the southern coast of Spain. It was not immediately clear what the impact would be on the referendum.
“It’s fairly clear no one is quite sure what has happened,” said John Curtice, professor of politics at the University of Strathclyde. “Until it’s clear who was responsible and what their motivation was or it might have been, all it does is stop the campaign when the ‘Remain’ side probably would not want it to be stopped.”
The pro-EU Remain campaign has fallen behind the Leave camp in pre-referendum polls.