George Floyd’s brother urged the United Nations to help African Americans.
Geneva, Switzerland:
George Floyd’s brother begged the United Nations to help African-Americans on Wednesday because “the lives of black people don’t matter in the United States”, while UN chief of human rights asked for reparations for centuries of discrimination.
Philonise Floyd delivered a passionate speech via video link to an urgent debate at the United Nations Human Rights Council on “systemic racism” in the United States and beyond.
Michelle Bachelet, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, said that the “gratuitous brutality” of Floyd’s death in police custody included racism that has hurt millions of people of African descent.
She also urged countries to confront the legacy of slavery and colonialism and to make reparations.
The Geneva-based council is debating a draft resolution urging Bachelet to investigate racism and violations of police civil liberties against people of African descent in the United States.
President Donald Trump removed the United States from the board two years ago.
Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, died in Minneapolis on May 25 after a white police officer – accused of murder – pressed his knee to Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes.
An amateur video of the incident sparked protests and calls to fight systemic racism in the United States and around the world.
Philonise Floyd said her brother was “tortured to death” when witnesses begged the officer to stop, “showing us the same lesson for blacks: black lives don’t matter to states United States of America “.
“You, the United Nations, are the custodians of your brothers and sisters in America, and you have the power to help us achieve justice for my brother George Floyd.”
“I ask you to help him. I ask you to help me. I ask you to help us as blacks in America.”
He urged them to create an independent international commission of inquiry – one of the highest investigations by the UN, usually reserved for major crises like the Syrian conflict.
– Abandoned probe proposal –
A first text presented Tuesday on behalf of 54 African countries had proposed such an investigation.
But the proposal was abandoned, the resolution heavily watered down following stiff opposition from Washington and some of its allies.
But the proposal was abandoned, the resolution heavily watered down following stiff opposition from Washington and some of its allies.
He now calls on Bachelet and UN rights experts to “establish the facts and circumstances related to systemic racism, alleged violations of international human rights law and abuse against Africans and people of ancestry police “by law enforcement agencies in the United States and beyond – particularly those incidents that have resulted in deaths.
The aim, he said, was “to ensure the responsibility of the perpetrators and the reparation of victims”.
In his statement to council, Bachelet said that Floyd’s death had caused the feeling of outrage felt by the neglected and that the protests were “the culmination of several generations of pain”.
“Behind today’s racial violence, systemic racism and discriminatory police hides the inability to recognize and confront the legacy of the slave trade and colonialism,” said the former Chilean president.
She stressed the need to “repair centuries of violence and discrimination, including through official apologies, truth-telling processes and various forms of reparation”.
– American call for transparency –
On Tuesday, Trump issued an order to improve police services, calling for a ban on dangerous bottlenecks – unless the life of an officer is in danger.
The decree encourages de-escalation training, better recruitment, sharing of data on police officers with bad records and money to support the police in complex tasks related to people with mental or drug-related problems .
However, it stopped well below requests made during national demonstrations.
Andrew Bremberg, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, said his country was open in its commitment to fight racial discrimination and injustice, citing Trump’s decree.
“We call on all governments to demonstrate the same level of transparency and accountability,” he said.
“Unfortunately, there are too many places in the world where governments commit serious human rights violations and practice systematic racial discrimination while many who have gathered in Geneva are silent.”
It remains to be seen whether the current draft resolution will be adopted.
Australia, South Korea and the Netherlands have all issued statements in the House which were largely supportive of Washington’s prospects.
“We trust their transparent judicial systems to deal with these issues appropriately,” said the representative of Australia.
The 47 members of the United Nations Human Rights Council are expected to vote on the resolution after the emergency debate, which was to conclude on Thursday.
On Wednesday, it is only the fifth time in 14 years of the Council’s history that it has agreed to hold an “urgent debate”, which resembles an extraordinary session, but within the framework of an ordinary session of the Council.
(With the exception of the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
