A lack of data in many countries on the race and ethnicity of people arrested or killed by police poses a major obstacle to combating systemic racism, UN investigators warned on Monday.

Speaking to the United Nations Human Rights Council, a panel of experts appointed after the 2020 killing of George Floyd by a white US police officer insisted that making systemic racism “visible” around the world was crucial.

There is a “critical need to collect, analyze, use and publish data disaggregated by racial or ethnic origin,” said Yvonne Mokgoro, a former South African judge who directs the United Nations’ so-called Expert Mechanism for Promoting Racial Justice and Equality directs law enforcement.

The team of three independent investigators submitted its first report to the Human Rights Council since its appointment last year, with a broad mandate to investigate police racism around the world.

Mokgoro said it is clear that “racial profiling, excessive use of force and other violations of international human rights law during and after interactions with law enforcement officials and the criminal justice system continue to be reported around the world.”

But, she warned, this “largely doesn’t show up in the official statistics.”

Mokgoro acknowledged that more data alone would not solve “persistent racism.”

However, she said it was “an essential first step in highlighting the extent of systemic racism against Africans and people of African descent and its manifestations in law enforcement and the criminal justice system”.

“It is essential that systemic racism, including its structural and institutional dimensions, becomes visible.”

In the United States, for example, where the May 2020 killing of Floyd, a 46-year-old unarmed black man, in Minneapolis sparked mass protests, there is no centralized system for collecting such statistics across more than 18,000 law enforcement agencies.

However, some NGOs and media organizations are trying to collect the data to get an overview.

Collette Flanagan, who founded Mothers Against Police Brutality after her black son Clinton Allen was killed by police in Dallas, Texas in 2013, told the council his case was symbolic of “the current crisis in policing in the United States.”

She said a black person was “2.5 times more likely to be shot by police” in the United States.

Her son was unarmed, but the white officer who shot him seven times “perceived my son as a threat,” she said.

“This officer evaded criminal and civil responsibility for the murder of my son.”

The United States is not the only country facing this problem.

Acting UN chief justice Nada Al-Nashif presented a separate report on Monday, detailing seven cases of police-related deaths highlighted by her office over the past year, including Floyds, but also cases from Brazil, Britain, Colombia and France.

She said none of the cases “have yet been brought to a full conclusion, with these families still seeking truth, justice and guarantees of non-recurrence.”

She highlighted some positive examples of efforts in different countries to tackle systemic racism, but warned that these remain largely “inadequate”.

US Ambassador Michele Taylor welcomed the report, recognizing “the progress, continued efforts, and commitment to this issue in the United States.”

“We will continue our efforts to reduce racial discrimination in law enforcement against people of African descent.”