The United States has been engulfed by protests, some of which have turned violent, over the killing of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer last week.

A video shared online from a bystander shows a white officer kneeling on his neck during his arrest as Floyd pleaded that he couldn’t breathe.

Dozens of cities across the United States remain under curfews not seen since riots after the 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

Floyd’s death was the latest case of police brutality against black men caught on videotape and prompting an outcry over racism in US law enforcement.

It reignited simmering racial tensions in a politically divided country that has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, with African Americans accounting for a disproportionately high number of cases.

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Header image: People lie down in the middle of the street in front of the Colorado State Capitol to protest on June 1, 2020 in Denver, Colorado. — AFP