Protesters demonstrate outside the United States Embassy in Paris on June 1, 2020, after the police killing of unarmed black man George Floyd in the USA. (Photo by AFP)

Authorities in France and Australia have banned demonstrations against racial discrimination in front of US diplomatic missions as protests mount across the world over the brutal murder of African-American George Floyd in Minneapolis.

French police banned anti-racism demonstrations planned outside the US embassy and on the lawns near the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Saturday.

Protesters in Paris were set to hold a big protest rally under the slogans of Let us breathe and No justice, no peace, echoing the words used by Floyd whose death has triggered mass demonstrations across the US as well as other parts of the world.

The Paris police department claimed that the decision over banning the Saturday protests had been made due to the risks of social disorder and health dangers from large gatherings in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

This is while the French capital was the scene of an anti-police demonstration on Wednesday, with thousands of protesters turning up despite a ban on the event held in memory of Adama Traore, a 24-year old black Frenchman who lost his life in police custody back in 2016 and his death has been likened to that of Floyd’s.

Floyd, a 46-year-old African American, died on May 25 in Minneapolis after a white officer pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes until he suffocated.

Some security officials and police officers in France have been accused in recent years of disproportionate and excessive use of force, particularly during the Yellow Vest protests in 2018 and 2019.

Australians defy bans at Black Lives Matters protests

Elsewhere in Australia, police imposed a ban on protests that were supposed to take place in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and Adelaide on Saturday over the death of Floyd in US police custody.

Defying police warnings that fines would be issued for breaching social-distancing rules, some 5,000 people wearing masks and holding Black Lives Matter placards protested peacefully in Brisbane on Saturday.

Protesters in Sydney vowed to rally even without a permit after the Supreme Court of the state, New South Wales (NSW), ruled protests unlawful on the pretext of coronavirus restrictions.

NSW Police Minister David Elliott stressed that the police were prepared for anybody who flouted the law, saying, Freedom of speech isn’t as free as we would like it to be at the moment.

In Victoria state, where gatherings of more than 20 people are unauthorized, Australian police threatened fines for protest organizers and people disregarding the bans. Queensland and Western Australia states also ordered people not to attend rallies.

Australians have been using their protests to also call for an end to the mistreatment of the country’s indigenous people by police. Indigenous Australians are the most incarcerated people in the world and hundreds of them have died in police custody.

China warns against travel to Australia

On Friday, China advised its citizens to avoid traveling to Australia, citing racial discrimination and violence in connection with the novel coronavirus pandemic.

There has been an alarming increase recently in acts of racial discrimination and violence against Chinese and Asians in Australia, due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, China’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism said in a statement, without providing any specific examples of such discrimination or violence.

Australia rejected the accusations and said they had no basis in fact.

Floyd’s death has reignited long-felt anger over police killings of African-Americans and unleashed a nationwide wave of civil unrest unlike any seen in the US since Martin Luther King Jr’s 1968 assassination.

US civil rights groups filed a lawsuit Thursday against President Donald Trump, after police fired tear gas to clear peaceful demonstrators outside the White House before the president walked to a church for a photo op earlier this week.

SOURCE: PRESS TV