Obama's tweet in response to Charlottesville breaks record

Washington: Former US President Barack Obama's response to the weekend's violence in Charlottesville in US state of Virginia, has broken the record for most Twitter likes, with a number of over 3 million on the social media platform.

"No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin or his background or his religion..." Obama tweeted Saturday night, quoting Nelson Mandela from the former South African president's autobiography "Long Walk to Freedom."
 

"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion..." pic.twitter.com/InZ58zkoAm

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017

Alongside the tweet, Obama posted a picture of himself smiling at toddlers of different racial backgrounds, which was taken at a day-care centre in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2011 by then-White House photographer Pete Souza.
 

"People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love..." — Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017

Obama also sent two additional tweets to complete the full Mandela quote, Xinhua news agency reported.
 

"...For love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite." - Nelson Mandela — Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017

As of Wednesday afternoon, the Obama tweet has had more than 3.7 million likes, making it the most-liked tweet of all time. It also ranks seventh among the most retweeted tweets according to tweet tracking site Favstar.

The previous most-liked tweet belongs to pop star Ariana Grande whose response to a deadly bombing at her concert in England was liked 2.7 million times.

The August 12 post, Obama's first tweet in three weeks, came after deadly white supremacist violence erupted in Charlottesville, a historic college town, over the weekend.

Obama keeps one of the most-followed Twitter accounts, with 93.5 million followers while, his successor Donald Trump, a more prolific Twitter user, only maintains 35.9 million followers for his primary account.