‘The systematic racial discrimination in the United States constitutes the world’s hottest human-rights issue,” said North Korea’s deputy ambassador to the U.N., during a Human Rights Council meeting on racism in the United States and around the world, prompted by the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
In the wake of Floyd’s death and the upheaval that has followed, an “urgent debate” was requested last week in a letter to the council written by Burkina Faso’s U.N. delegation on behalf of 54 African countries. Their intention was to examine “racially inspired human rights violations, police brutality against people of African descent and the violence against the peaceful protests that call for these injustices to stop.” The request for a debate was also backed by more than 600 non-governmental organizations and Floyd’s family. And so, it began yesterday and ended Thursday morning. The council will vote on a resolution Friday or Monday.
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