The UN has urged the United States to investigate racial discrimination within its law enforcement and judicial systems, after a white officer who killed an unarmed black teen walked free.
"I am deeply concerned at the disproportionate number of young African Americans who die in encounters with police officers, as well as the disproportionate number of African Americans in US prisons and the disproportionate number of African Americans on Death Row," UN rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein said in a statement on Tuesday.
His comment came after a grand jury decided not to indict officer Darren Wilson, who shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri in August.
Zeid said he had not seen the details of the evidence and could therefore not comment on the verdict, which sparked riots in Ferguson.
Zeid echoed Michael Brown's parents' call for calm, urging "all protestors to avoid violence and destruction in the wake of this decision".
He stressed though that "at least among some sectors of the population, there is a deep and festering lack of confidence in the fairness of the justice and law enforcement systems".
"I urge the US authorities to conduct in-depth examinations into how race related issues are affecting law enforcement and the administration of justice, both at the federal and state levels," he said.
Zeid pointing out that "concerns about institutionalised discrimination in the US" had repeatedly been raised by various UN bodies.
The UN rights chief also referred to the Cleveland police killing at the weekend of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was waving what turned out to be a toy gun in a playground.
"In many countries, where real guns are not so easily available, police tend to view boys playing with replica guns as precisely what they are, rather than as a danger to be neutralised," Zeid said.
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