London ~ Hate crimes recorded by police in England and Wales were on the rise in the year ending March this year, with religiously aggravated and racially motivated incidents registering a spike in the latest statistics released by the UK Home Office on Thursday.

There were 115,990 hate crimes logged by police forces in both regions, a 2 per cent increase compared with the previous year, with race hate offences accounting for the majority at 71 per cent or 82,490 offences, followed by religious hate at 7,164 offences.

Within these figures, anti-Muslim hate crimes were at a record high of 4,478 offences (45 per cent), followed by 2,873 (29 per cent) anti-Jewish crimes, 502 anti-Christian hate offences (5 per cent), 259 (3 per cent) anti-Sikh and 182 (2 per cent) anti-Hindu hate crimes.

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