200 arrests over four days as Met targets knives

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Scotland Yard's new task force, launched to stamp out stabbings, searched 5,395 people and recovered 231 knives during a series of stop and searches across London last weekend.

The Blunt 2 task force arrested 237 people for possession of weapons and other knife-related crime. Deputy Commissioner Paul Stephenson launched the 75-strong force after 16-year-olds Ben Kinsella and Shakilus Townsend were stabbed to death within days of each other last week.

Following the death of 14-year-old David Idowu on Monday, 19 teenagers have been killed in the capital this year - including 14 which were knifed to death. The figures forced the Met to put the Blunt 2 team into action - a team born out of the Met's anti-knife operation Blunt 2 which began in May.

Including the weekend's figures, police have arrested 1,437 people, recovered 731 knives, and searched 32,395 people in seven weeks. A source within the Blunt task force said: "It shows we are committed to reducing knife crime across London and the launch of this task force is clearly having an impact on those individuals who persist on carrying knives.

He warned: "They will be caught, arrested and dealt with."

It came as Mayor Boris Johnson said the fight against the capital's knife crisis was not "hopeless"

As he watched police at work on their anti-knife crime operation at Mile End Tube station, in which commuters were invited to pass through scanners, he said the culture of teenagers carrying knives was "silly and self-destructive".

Mr Johnson said: "Operation Blunt 2 is clearly an important part of the fightback against the terrible scourge of knife crime."

He added: "And I back the police's decision to charge rather than caution the vast majority of young people found with knives."