NBA’s rising star Hachimura gets racist messages ‘almost every day’

Hachimura

Japanese NBA rising star Rui Hachimura (below) said he receives racist messages "almost every day", as uproar grows over the abuse directed at top athletes online.

His revelation comes after England's Premier League led a social media boycott to protest against racist taunts suffered by footballers including Marcus Rashford and Reece James.

Hachimura, 23, a forward for the NBA team Washington Wizards, was commenting after his brother - a basketball player at a Japanese university - tweeted a screenshot of an offensive message he had received. "There are people who say there is no racism in Japan," wrote Aren Hachimura, 21, alongside an image of the direct message in Japanese that used a racist insult and told him to "die".

Rui, who has nearly 2,00,000 Twitter followers and was selected for the NBA Rising Stars roster in March, replied: "I receive this kind of thing almost every day."

The Hachimuras, whose father is Beninese and mother is Japanese, are just the latest sports stars to speak out.

Premier League clubs and players stayed off social media over the weekend, but Manchester City forward Raheem Sterling was racially abused on Instagram less than 48 hours after the boycott ended.

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