United Kingdom has seen a rise in xenophobic attacks. Seventeen-year-old refugee suffered ‘repeated blows to the head’ in an attack police are treating as a hate crime.

Four men and two women, all aged between 20 and 24, are being held at a south London police station for questioning, Scotland Yard said.

They were arrested at addresses in Croydon late on Saturday on suspicion of attempted murder and violent disorder.

Police are treating the attack as a suspected hate crime.

The 17-year-old victim, a Kurdish Iranian, was waiting at a bus stop on Friday evening with two friends outside The Goat pub, in Broom Road, when a group approached them.

After discovering he was an asylum seeker they chased him and launched a vicious assault, repeatedly kicking him on the floor and aiming blows to his head.

“The suspects asked the victim where he was from and when they established that he was an asylum seeker they chased him and launched a brutal attack,” Detective Sergeant Kris Blamires said in a statement on Saturday.

“He has sustained serious head and facial injuries as a result of this attack, which included repeated blows to the head by a large group of attackers,” he added.

“A number of bystanders and eyewitnesses tried to intervene and say to the attackers that enough is enough.

“By all accounts they didn’t actually stop until the sound of police sirens were heard in the background.”

The 17-year-old was taken to a London hospital for treatment, while his two friends escaped with minor injuries.

Police appealed for information and witnesses and said they were treating the attack as a hate crime.

No arrests have been made.