WASHINGTON, June 2. /TASS/. Russia’s embassy in the United States has condemned the use of force against journalists covering the protests in that country.
"We consider it unacceptable for US law enforcement officials to use special equipment · rubber bullets and tear gas · against media representatives," the embassy wrote on its Facebook account on Tuesday.
"Sputnik journalist Nicole Roussell was fired at by police several times in Washington, DC," it recalled.
Sputnik's U.S. editor-in-chief, Mindia Gavasheli, told the Rossiya-24 television channel earlier in the day that Sputnik producer Nicole Roussell had received wounds while covering mass protests in front of the White House. "She had a journalist’s ID and repeatedly told the police who she was," Gavasheli said. "The policemen could not but see that she was a journalists, but despite this, they began to beat her with their batons. And when she broke into a run, they began to shoot at her from some nonlethal weapons. As a result, she received a shrapnel wound."
Minnesota and a number of other states have plunged into massive protests and rioting after a video showing the moment of brutal detention of African American George Floyd by a police patrol in Minneapolis on May 25. Floyd was suspected of using forged banknotes. The man died in a local hospital shortly afterwards. On May 26, four police were fired and one of them put under arrest and charged with unpremeditated murder.