BANGKOK (AP) – Several thousand people marched in New Zealand’s largest city on Monday to protest the killing of George Floyd in the U.S. as well as to stand up against police violence and racism in their own country.
Many people around the world have watched with growing unease at the civil unrest in the U.S. after the latest in a series of police killings of black men and women. Floyd died on May 25 in Minneapolis after a white police officer pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck until he stopped breathing. The officer was fired and charged with murder.
The protesters in Auckland marched to the U.S. Consulate, where they kneeled. They held banners with slogans like “I can’t breathe” and “The real virus is racism.” Hundreds more joined the peaceful protests and vigils elsewhere in New Zealand, where Monday was a public holiday.
In Iran, which has in the recent past violently put down nationwide demonstrations by killing hundreds, arresting thousands and disrupting internet access to the outside world, state television has repeatedly aired images of the U.S. unrest.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi urged the U.S. government and police to stop the violence.