protests have erupted in several major u.s. cities on Friday night after the death earlier this week of George Floyd, a black American, during his arrest in Minneapolis, and this, despite the indictment for manslaughter of the police officer arrested after several days of riots.
hundreds of people gathered across the country, like in front of the White House in Washington, but also in New York, Dallas, Houston, city of origin of the victim, or Las Vegas, Des Moines, Memphis, and Portland. In Atlanta, the patrol vehicles of the police were burned. A curfew is in force since Friday in Minneapolis, defied by protesters who have been firing tear gas.
“We are already dead, so you might as well die for a good cause”
The family of George Floyd, age 46, to which the president, Donald Trump has announced that it has spoken, has welcomed the arrest of the police officer as a first step on ” the path of righteousness “, but found “late” and inadequate. “We want an indictment for intentional homicide with premeditation. And we want to see the other agents (involved) stopped, ” she said in a press release. For the moment, only the police officer Derek Chauvin “has been placed in custody,” said commissioner John Harrington, of the department of public Safety of Minnesota.
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The face of that agent has been around the world, since a video that has become viral shows heckling violently on Monday for a minor offence George Floyd, and placing his knee on his neck. George Floyd begs and complains : “I can’t breathe “, the hear-say. Derek Chauvin and the other three officers involved in the drama have been fired and investigations, federal and local have been opened in order to establish their responsibilities. Derek Chauvin is accused of having committed an act that is cruel and dangerous causing death, and manslaughter, said the prosecutor of the county of Hennepin, which is located in Minneapolis.
This development follows a third night of riots in this great city of Minnesota, in the north of the country, where protesters have been calling for criminal sanctions at the height of the violence suffered by the victim. The national guard has been deployed to try to restore calm and a curfew decreed from on Friday evening, 20 hours of local up to 6 hours the next day, while a police station was burnt down in the previous night and several shops were looted.
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” We crashed for far too long. We die, brother, with the knee of someone on our neck while we did nothing (…). Then it is finished, we are tired. I mean, we’re already dead, so you might as well die for a good cause, right ? ” told the Agence France-Presse a protester in Minneapolis, who has only wanted to be identified by his first name, in Chicago.
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Donald Trump, who has repeatedly criticised a crime, ” tragic “, has hit out at the ” rioters “. “The looting will be immediately greeted by bullets “, he added in a tweet, as the social network has decided to report it as a ” glorification of violence “. In a tone diametrically opposed to, his predecessor, democrat Barack Obama said “share the distress of millions of black Americans, for whom” being treated differently on the basis of race is tragically, painfully and in a way rageante normal “.
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In the night from Thursday to Friday, for the third time, the protests have turned to rioting in the vicinity of the police station where worked the four men. Faced with the advance of the protesters, the security forces had abandoned the scene to 22 hours. Some protesters then managed to force the security gates, break windows and set fire to the building. Several shops nearby have experienced a similar fate and the violence have also won some districts of the nearby city of Saint Paul, with clashes sporadic between police and residents.
The anger has won several other american cities, and hundreds of persons have manifested itself in front of the White House in Washington, waving placards through slogans such as ” Stop killing us “. In New York, there are nearly a thousand demonstrators who gathered to castigate the police, while in Denver, a highway was blocked. In Louisville, Kentucky, clashes took place while residents were seeking justice for Breonna Taylor, a black woman killed by police in his apartment in march.
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The emotion has surpassed u.s. borders, and calls to bring justice to George Floyd were all the rage on the social networks in several countries. The case recalls the death of Eric Garner, a black man who died in 2014 in New York city after having been asphyxiated during his arrest by white police officers. He had also said : “I can’t breathe “, a phrase that became a rallying cry of the movement Black Lives Matter (” the life of The Black account “). “Enough is enough “, said his mother, Gwen Carr, New York on Friday. “They need to stop coming into our neighborhoods and terrorize and kill our young people. “
