Madrid
Calling for racial justice, protesters rallied across Europe Sunday, joining a wave of demonstrations sparked by the death of African American George Floyd at the hands of US police.
A video of the incident with Floyd pleading for his life in Minneapolis as a white police officer knelt on his neck has sparked angry protests worldwide, even as countries continue to discourage large gatherings to curb the coronavirus pandemic. Several thousand people massed outside the US embassy in Madrid, shouting “I cannot breathe”, Floyd’s last words, and demanding justice.
“Racism knows no borders,” said Leinisa Seemdo, a 26-year-old Spanish translator from Cape Verde. “In all the countries where I have lived, I have experienced discrimination because of the colour of my skin.” Rome’s Piazza del Popolo (“People’s Plaza”) fell silent for eight minutes — roughly the time Floyd was pinned down by the policeman — as thousands of people took a knee in memory of Floyd, their fists in the air.
“We can’t breathe,” shouted the crowd, after the collective silence. “It’s really hard to live here,” said Senegalese migrant Morikeba Samate, 32, one of the thousands to have arrived in Italy after risking the perilous crossing across the Mediterranean. Opposition to that wave of migration buoyed the far-right in Italy and elsewhere in Europe.
Floyd’s death last month has unleashed the most serious and widespread civil unrest in the United States since Martin Luther King was assassinated in 1968. The police officer, Derek Chauvin, has been charged with second-degree murder while three fellow officers face lesser charges.
Democrats vowed Sunday to press legislation to fight systemic racism in US law enforcement as the battle for change triggered by the police killing of George Floyd began shifting from the streets to the political sphere. After another day of overwhelmingly peaceful protests across the US, President Donald Trump ordered National Guard troops to begin withdrawing from the nation’s capital. Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat who has jousted with Trump over the use of force in her city, told Fox News there had been no arrests on Saturday despite the massive protests. Demonstrations continued across the nation Sunday — including in Washington, New York and Winter Park, Florida — as protesters began focusing their initial outrage over the death of the unarmed Floyd into demands for police reform and social justice.
Trump’s tough approach to putting down protests continued to draw exceptional rebukes from top retired military officers, a group normally loath to criticize a civilian leader. Former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Colin Powell joined them Sunday, saying Trump had “drifted away” from the Constitution. Powell, a Republican moderate, said Trump had weakened America’s position around the world and that in November’s presidential election he would support Democrat Joe Biden.
Condoleezza Rice, who succeeded Powell as secretary of state under President George W. Bush, told CBS she would “absolutely” oppose using the military against peaceful protesters, adding, “This isn’t a battlefield.” But administration officials again defended their approach, with Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf telling ABC that Washington had been “a city out of control.”—APP
