The brother of George Floyd, the black American who was killed when arrested by a white policeman, called on the United Nations today, Wednesday, to help black Americans, particularly by "establishing an independent commission of inquiry" About police violence.
"I am the protector of my brother," said Felonez Floyd, who died in Minneapolis, Minnesota, after a white policeman put his knee on his neck for about nine minutes on May 25.
"It could have been me," he added in a strongly worded video message broadcast during an urgent session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva on police racism and brutality.
"At the United Nations, you are the protectors of your brothers and sisters in America. You have the ability to help us get justice for my brother ... I ask you to help him."
"I am asking you to help me. I am asking you to help us blacks in America. I hope you will consider setting up an independent commission of inquiry to investigate the police killing of blacks in America and violence against peaceful protesters," he said.
Floyd´s death sparked a wave of protests nationwide in the United States and abroad for ethnic justice and police reform.
His brother denounced the police crackdown on the demonstrators.
"When people dared to raise their voices and protest for my brother, they were beaten with tear gas and run over by police cars," he said.
Floyd told the council that several people had lost their eyes and had brain damage due to rubber bullets.
"When people raise their voices to protest the treatment of blacks in America, they are silenced. They are shot and killed," he added.
Floyd said that his brother "is one of many black men and women killed by the police."
"The sad fact is that the case is not unique," he said, explaining that "the way you saw my brother being tortured and killed in front of the camera is the way the black police in America are treated."
