TENSIONS mounted at a Nottingham memorial service to remember the life of murdered soldier Lee Rigby on Saturday.
About 50 people gathered outside the Trent Bridge Inn before walking down to the war memorial on the Victoria Embankment to lay flowers and hold a two-minute silence in memory of soldier Lee Rigby, 25, who was murdered in Woolwich, London, by two men on Wednesday, May 22.
As the contingent approached the memorial a separate group had gathered about 20 yards from the memorial holding anti-English Defence League banners.
One banner read 'EDL are fascist racists' while another simply said 'hate violence, not Muslims'.
Jay Clark, of Clifton, said he had organised the event and it had no connection to the English Defence League.
He said: "I don't know where they have got that idea from, it's shocking really.
"We are just normal people who want to pay our respects."
Many other members of the crowd said they had nothing to do with the EDL including Dave Baldwin, 63, of Clifton, who said: "There is good and bad in every religion and race.
"I just wanted to commemorate the life of someone who was brutally murdered. It was shocking. I know the EDL have a bad reputation, I'm not part of that. I just want to pay my respects."
A few police officers separated the two groups, and there was no violence or any arrests.
A member of the opposing group Roger Tanner, 63, said: "We do not support the vision of hatred set out by the EDL."
Another man, who did not want to be named, said: "Anyone who thinks that the memorial service is not an EDL march is sadly misinformed."
The English Defence League is a far-right group which opposes what it considers to be a spread of Islam and Islamic extremism in the UK.
Despite the organisers of Saturday's event saying it had nothing to do with the EDL, the group posted messages about it on its Facebook page, encouraging members to go along.
After the event, its Nottingham Division posted a message which read: "Cracking turnout and top day despite the left attempting to spoil it. Rest in peace Lee Rigby."
