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Iran further berates US over police killing, slams racism

By REUTERS

MAY 31, 2020 00:05

Iran, always keen to score points against its longtime foe the United States, took Washington to task on Saturday over the killing of a black man by a white police officer that has sparked angry protests over racial injustice.

"Some don't think #BlackLivesMatter," Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Twitter. "To those of us who do: it is long overdue for the entire world to wage war against racism. Time for a #WorldAgainstRacism."

"The US government is squandering its citizens' resources, whether its adventurism in Asia, Africa, or Latin America...," Zarif said in a tweet partly based on a message that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo sent to Iranian street protesters in 2018, but with some of the words changed.

Iran's Foreign Ministry earlier denounced the police killing of the unarmed black man in Minneapolis, which has sparked protests in several cities, some which have turned violent.

A ministry statement condemned what it called "the tragic murder of black people and deadly racial discrimination in the United States."

"The voices of the protesters must be heard ... (and) the repression of suffering Americans must be stopped immediately," the ministry statement said.

Iran’s Ayatollah Khamenei earlier tweeted that “if you’re dark-skinned walking in the US, you can’t be sure you’ll be alive in the next few minutes.”

Seth Frantzman contributed to this report.

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