Anti-racism protestors again took to the streets in cities across the United States Sunday to voice their fury at police brutality.
The protests held despite Trump administration branding the instigators of five nights of rioting domestic terrorists.
While local leaders appealed to citizens to give constructive outlet to their rage over the death of George Floyd, an unarmed black man, night-time curfews were again imposed in cities such as Los Angeles, Houston and Minneapolis, which has been the epicentre of unrest.
Thousands of National Guards troops have been deployed across the country in a bid to restore calm but protesters and police were involved in stand-offs in several cities while there were also fresh reports of looting.
The most closely-watched protest was outside the state capitol in Minneapolis’ twin city of St. Paul where several thousand people gathered before marching down a highway.
“We have black sons, black brothers, black friends, we don’t want them to die. We are tired of this happening, this generation is not having it, we are tired of oppression,” said Muna Abdi, a 31-year-old black woman who joined the protest.
“I want to make sure he stays alive,” she added in reference to her son aged three.
Hundreds of police and National Guard troops were deployed ahead of the protest although there were no immediate reports of unrest.
While there was no immediate repeat of the large-scale violence that has rocked cities in recent days, looters ransacked stores in a neighbourhood of Philadelphia.
And in the Los Angeles suburb of Santa Monica, looting was reported at stores in a popular beachside shopping centre with people running out of stores that had been broken into.
Officials in LA — a city scarred by riots over the police killing of Rodney King nearly three decades ago — imposed a curfew from 4:00 pm Sunday until dawn.
The shocking videotaped death Monday of Floyd, at the hands of police in Minneapolis ignited the nationwide wave of outrage over law enforcement’s repeated use of lethal force against unarmed African Americans.
Floyd stopped breathing after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. Chauvin has been charged with third-degree murder; three other officers with him have been fired but for now face no charges.
Governor Tim Walz has mobilized all of Minnesota’s National Guard troops — the state guard’s biggest mobilization ever — to help restore order.
(AFP)
