A child protester is pictured at a protest in the Wendys restaurant in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 17, 2020. (Photo by AFP)
US protesters have once again taken to the streets in Atlanta against police brutality in the wake of yet another fatal shooting of a black man, Rayshard Brooks, at the hands of a white police officer.
Black Lives Matter demonstrators staged a die-in protest in front of the Atlanta Police Department headquarters on Wednesday, as a symbol of black lives taken by police in the country.
They "reclaim space and demand accountability," over the death of Brooks, who was shot twice in the back during an attempted arrest at a restaurant parking lot on Friday night.
Officer Garrett Rolfe, who fired the shots, was charged on Wednesday with murder and aggravated assault in the shooting.
Brooks death came amid ongoing protests in US cities, and across the world, over the killing of an African-American man, George Floyd, in Minneapolis by a white police officer on May 25.
Floyd was choked to death after the officer kneeled on his neck for almost nine minutes.
The killing that was caught on camera reignited debates about the scale of US police violence and discrimination against people of color in the American society.
Widespread protests forced President Donald Trump, who had threatened to deploy the military on the streets to put down the anti-racism protests, to issue an executive order that would discourage police from using chokeholds.
Critics, however, said the order fell far short of the demands of Black Lives Matter activists seeking fundamental change and police reform in the US.
Activists and lawmakers have demanded an outright ban on chokeholds with no exception and on no-knock warrants, among other things.
The president, however, said chokeholds will be banned "except if an officers life is at risk."
US police have been criticized in recent days for their heavy-handed tactics against protesters as indiscriminate use of tear gas, flash grenades, and many incidents of excessive police force against anti-racism protesters have been recorded and gone viral.
SOURCE: PRESS TV
LINK: https://www.ansarpress.com/english/18667
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