Hollywood couple Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively have donated $200,000 to the NAACP Legal Defence Fund following the death of George Floyd.

The charity is ’America’s premier legal organisation fighting for racial justice’, according to its website.

The couple posted a joint statement, which said: "We’ve never had to worry about preparing our kids for different rules of law or what might happen if we’re pulled over in the car. 

"We don’t know what it’s like to experience that life day in and day out. We can’t imagine feeling that kind of fear and anger. We’re ashamed that in the past we’ve allowed ourselves to be uninformed about how deeply rooted systemic racism is.

"We’ve been teaching our children differently than the way our parents taught us. We want to educate ourselves about other people’s experiences and talk to our kids about everything, all of it… especial our own complicity.  

"We talk about our bias, blindness and our own mistakes. We look back and see so many mistakes which have led us to deeply examine who we are and who we want to become. They’ve led us to huge avenues of education. 

"We’re committed to raising our kids so they never grow up feeding this insane pattern and so they’ll do their best to never inflict pain on another being consciously or unconsciously.  

“It’s the least we can do to honor not just George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and Eric Garner, but all the black men and women who have been killed when the camera wasn’t rolling.”

Floyd died last Monday in police custody, after an officer was seen clearly kneeling on his neck for eight minutes while arresting him in the city of Minneapolis. 

White police officer Derek Chauvin has been charged with murder.