UNITED NATIONS, August 29 (APP): The United Nations human rights office has condemned the shooting of Jacob Blake, an African-American man, in the U.S. state of Wisconsin, saying the video footage of appeared to show that the police officer had used “excessive” force.
“It does not appear that the law enforcement officers abided by the international standard of intentional use of lethal force with a firearm,” Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said at a virtual briefing in Geneva, describing the shooting as a “painful reminder of how African Americans continue to be exposed to differentiated and heightened risk, when engaging with law enforcement bodies in the United States.”
Riots broke out in the city of Kenosha, Wisconsin, in the wake of Sunday’s police shooting of Blake, which has left the 29-year-old African American man partially paralyzed.
Colville, who was responding to a question at his virtual briefing, said the episode reaffirms the need for urgent action to eradicate links between structural racism and policing.
“From the images available that we have seen at this point, the police appears to use force against Jacob Blake that would seem to be excessive and it does not appear the law enforcement officers abided by the international standards of the intentional use of lethal force with a firearm,” he said.
A statement from the Kenosha police union said that based on officers’ inability to gain compliance and control from Blake after using verbal, physical and less lethal means, the officers drew their firearms. Colville said it seems highly possible the force used against Blake could have been discriminatory in nature.
The human rights spokesman also said he was aghast at the presence of vigilantes at the protests in Kenosha that followed the police shooting of Blake. He said he found the killing of two people and injury of others by a 17-year-old gunman of particular concern.
“We would see this as yet another unfortunate example of the insufficient and lax gun control measures in the United States, which is something we have spoken about several times before,” said Colville. “It should be inconceivable that you have a 17-year-old running around with an automatic rifle in a position to shoot people in this way in such a tense situation.”
He said the UN rights office had issued several calls to ban assault rifles and adopt other measures to control civilian acquisition, possession, and use of firearms to preempt such killings.
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