In a video on social media, Amanda Zahui talks about her feelings about the police violence that upset many over the past week. For SVT Sport, she talks about the importance of talking about what happened.

- We are not talking about how blacks are treated here. And to be someone who is on the level that I play and to be the face of Sweden in the basketball. It felt important to all of us living here as well.

Does it have any impact, do you think, when a sports star takes a stand in this way?

- I think that people who are not conscious, because there are those who are not, about what is going on in the world, they get a direct picture. And then it is for those who cannot or do not know how to speak or use their words and feelings - that they feel a community that they are not themselves in this, she says and continues:

- What feels like the conversations are very low and silent. And this is nothing we need to be careful about. This is our reality and something we need to talk about. Because if we sit still we make no difference.

"Parents who shouted the n-word and called me monkey"

Zahui also tells of the first time she herself was exposed to racism.

- I think the first time it happened I played children's basketball. I had just started playing and it was parents who shouted the n-word and called me a monkey. It was probably the first time in sports that I heard it and I felt ... wow ... there are racists here too.

- Just because we play a sport does not mean that we are safe in any way.

Zahui ends by emphasizing the importance of athletes and her own openness on important social issues.

- I'll keep talking. Be a person that people can reach and that people can understand. Just because I play at a high level does not mean that I am less human.

See the WHOLE report here:

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Amanda Zahui in an interview with SVT Sport. Photo: Marcus Östling / SVT