US urged to address racial injustice or risk further instability in new report

A failure to confront the “deep pain and injustice borne by the African American community” in response to the police killing of George Floyd will result in further “division and instability” in the United States, according to a new analysis by the International Crisis Group.

The organization, an international security thinktank based in Brussels, describes its mission over the past quarter-century as “working to prevent wars and shape policies that will build a more peaceful world”.

Related: US police have a history of violence against black people. Will it ever stop?

It compiles many in-depth reports and briefings on global trouble spots with an emphasis on de-escalating armed conflict. In recent weeks it has produced reports on the Islamic State group in Niger, violence in north-west Nigeria and Syria’s war-torn Idlib province.

This statement is the first time the group has written about the US domestic situation in such terms.

“George Floyd’s killing sparked a firestorm of protest and violence in part because it met such an abundance of dry tinder,” the group stated. The United States “never adequately come to terms with the horrific legacy of two and a half centuries of chattel slavery. Nor has it healed or conquered the institutionalised violence and racism toward African Americans that followed their emancipation in the 1860s.”

The unrest began following an encounter between a white Minneapolis police officer and Floyd, a 46-year-old black man. After a brief struggle, the officer pinned his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes. Floyd protested and pleaded that he could not breath at least 16 times before losing consciousness and dying.

Protests touched off in Minneapolis and have now spread to 140 cities in all 50 US states. Most demonstrations have been peaceful, but there have also been instances of violence and looting such as the burning of a Minneapolis police precinct, damage to CNN’s headquarters in Atlanta and shops being looted in New York and Los Angeles.

Meanwhile, police and the national guard have beaten and tear gassed protestors, often when they are being peaceful, and assaulted and injured dozens of journalists.

The report implores Donald Trump, as well as prominent elected and security officials, to stop courting conflict with incendiary language and threats to deploy the military to quell civil unrest.

“Perhaps the most sobering political development as the protests reached the one-week mark was a growing inclination among some prominent elected and security officials to frame the civil unrest in the language of armed conflict,” the report states, citing comments by Trump, who has called protesters “thugs” as well as the Ssecretary of Ddefense, Mark Esper, who has urged state governors to “dominate the battlespace”.

The killing, and the Trump administration’s response to the upheaval, risk further eroding the “global standing and credibility” of the US “particularly when it comes to condemning repression or brutality perpetrated by other governments”, the Crisis Group said.

“Since assuming office in 2017, Trump has made much of his desire to pull the US back from overseas wars,” it concludes. “He should take great pains not to act like he wants one at home.”

Police brutality toward black men and women is “both a chronic problem and a recurrent source of instability in US cities”, according to the analysis, which catalogues several high-profile incidents, including the assault Rodney King in 1992, the fatal shooting of Michael Brown in 2014 and the death in custody of Freddie Gray in 2015.

The only long-term solution is addressing the systemic racial disparities that continue to plague the nation, the report concludes.

But in the immediate future, local authorities must ensure that “justice is done”. It called the decision by the Minnesota attorney general, Keith Ellison, to bring charges against three other officers involved and upgrade the charge against the officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck a “good start”.

The unrest in the US has attracted the attention of overseas groups and figures. Several international organizations have expressed solidarity with the protesters while urging nonviolence and restraint by the administration.

Related: New York police take seconds to restore reputation for brutality

The UN secretary general, António Guterres, weighed in, acknowledging that “grievances must be heard” and calling on authorities to “show restraint”.

On Wednesday, the UN high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet, implored the US to confront “endemic and structural racism” and address the “deep-seated grievances” at the heart of the protests.

She assailed the president’s characterization of protesters as “terrorists” and condemned the “unprecedented assault on journalists”.

“The anger we have seen in the US, erupting as Covid-19 exposes glaring inequalities in society, shows why far-reaching reforms and inclusive dialogue are needed there to break the cycle of impunity for unlawful killings by police and racial bias in policing,” she said.