London (AFP) - UK leader Keir Starmer accused US tech tycoon Elon Musk on Thursday of “trying to whip up division” in Britain following anger over the police handling of the murder of a white student by a Sikh man.

The case of 18-year-old Henry Nowak, who was put in handcuffs by police as he lay mortally wounded after being stabbed by Vickrum Digwa in the southern city of Southampton in December, has become highly politicised in the UK.

Digwa, 23, lied and told police he was the victim as Nowak had racially insulted him.

The prime minister met Nowak’s mother, father and stepmother at Downing Street on Thursday evening. They spent around an hour inside.

Afterwards, Starmer said the country must “choose unity and progress over division and hatred”, calling this “the only way to honour Henry’s memory”.

Far-right figures have claimed the murder is evidence that police forces in Britain treat white people and ethnic minorities differently – an allegation Starmer’s Labour government and police chiefs vehemently deny.

Musk, the billionaire owner of X, has posted numerous times on the platform about the police response to the stabbing.

In one, he asked whether people knew that “official police policy requires them to be racist against Whites?”

Black people in England and Wales are more than twice as likely to be arrested as white people, according to government statistics.

An independent report last year found Britain’s largest police force, London’s Metropolitan Police, was “institutionally racist”.

Musk has offered to fund a private prosecution against the police over its handling of the murder and insulted the Hampshire Police force involved.

“We need to also assert who we are as a country, because Musk, again, has been interfering in our politics in the last few days, trying to whip up division. That is not who we are in Britain,” Starmer told reporters.

“In Britain, we are reasonable, tolerant people,” he added.

“When we have a terrible case like Henry’s case… we react calmly, as his family have done,” the prime minister said, referring to pleas from Nowak’s father that his son’s murder should not be used “to create further division, hatred or tension”.

Digwa was jailed for at least 21 years on Monday for stabbing Nowak to death using a knife with a 21-centimetre (eight-inch) blade following an altercation about a mobile phone.

Starmer has said there was “no justification” for violence at a Southampton protest on Tuesday night attended by far-right agitators, which saw demonstrators throw bricks, flares and chairs at police officers.

A 44-year-old man on Thursday pleaded guilty to violent disorder and carrying an offensive weapon. Another person has been charged with assault.

- ‘Lies and misinformation’ -

The prime minister said it was “unforgivable” that hard-right firebrand Nigel Farage, whose Reform UK party is leading in the polls, had called for people to respond to the murder with “pure cold rage”.

Farage, who has been accused of stoking racial tensions with his remarks, has defended his comments.

Starmer has called bodycam footage of Nowak’s death, during which the victim can repeatedly be heard telling officers he could not breathe, “harrowing”.

On Thursday, Starmer said there were “difficult questions that need to be answered about the way the police handled Henry’s murder”.

“We will be unflinching in taking whatever action is required to right the wrongs in this case,” he added.

The Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) watchdog is investigating and is expected to report back within the next three months.

An inquest into whether police contributed to Nowak’s death will open in front of a jury in September 2027, officials announced Thursday.

Musk has long been an outspoken critic of Starmer, who served as a chief state prosecutor before entering politics.

The pair clashed last year over a decades-long “grooming gangs” sexual abuse scandal.

In that case the prime minister accused the world’s richest man of “spreading lies and misinformation”.