Woman says she tried to "talk down" suspects in London slaying

(CBS News) The British government has not yet released the name of the victim of a savage, likely terror-related murder in London on Wednesday, but military officials confirm he was a serving soldier in the British Army.

CBS News correspondent Charlie D'Agata reports the two men suspected in the attack spent Wednesday night under armed guard at separate hospitals as forensic teams continued to scour the scene of the brutal slaying.

Prime Minister David Cameron called an emergency meeting of his intelligence chiefs, meanwhile, to address what he called a "sickening attack."

Shortly after the murder, one suspect -- with bloodstained hands, clutching a a knife and meat cleaver -- shared his justification for the attack with stunned bystanders.

"This British soldier is an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth," the suspect said, as an onlooker recorded the remarks on a cell phone. "I apologize that women had to witness that, but in our lands, our women have to see the same thing."

Both suspects remained at the scene after the soldier was killed, and one woman stepped forward in an attempt to talk the two men down.

Loyau Kennet said she asked the man why he had done it. "He said he's a British soldier, he's killed people, he killed Muslim people in Muslim countries and have nothing to do here. And I said okay, so what would you like? And I tried to talk about what he felt, and he said all the bombs dropping and killing blindly, women, children, all Muslims."

She told Britain's ITV that she tried to talk the suspects out of confronting the police and asked one of the men to hand over his knife. The suspects did not flee the scene, but instead stayed and engaged with Loyau Kennet, allowing bystanders to capture them on cell phone cameras.

When police did arrive, the men charged forward and police opened fire.

"I think the fact that they waited to be caught is indicative of what they're after, which is publicity," Peter Clarke, a former counterterrorism commander with London's Metropolitan Police, told CBS News. "And one of them apparently said, 'We want to start a war tonight.' What they are trying to do is turn the population against itself."

Wednesday night, demonstrators from the English Defence League -- a far-right anti-Islamic group that describes itself as a "movement dedicated to peacefully protesting against Islamic extremism" -- clashed with police outside the barracks where the attack took place, and there have been reports of arrests made in connection with attacks on mosques, D'Agata reports.