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African and Caribbean nations agree move to seek reparations for slavery, call for formal apologies from European nations (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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The partnership between the 55-member African Union and the Caribbean Community (Caricom) of 20 countries will aim to intensify pressure on former slave-owning nations to engage with the reparations movement.

Delegates also announced the establishment of a global fund based in Africa aiming to accelerate the campaign.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

A global movement to seek reparations for slavery has been forged during a summit in Ghana this week, with the African Union partnering with Caribbean countries to form a “united front” to persuade European nations to pay for “historical mass crimes”.

Carla Barnett, Caricom’s secretary general, told the conference: “We are at an important inflection point in the global movement for reparatory justice.” She said it was critical to “speak with one voice to advance the call for reparations”.

Asked earlier this year by the Labour MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy whether he would offer a “full and meaningful apology for our country’s role in slavery and colonialism” and commit to reparatory justice, the UK prime minister, Rishi Sunak, replied “no”, adding that while it was important to have an inclusive and tolerant society, “trying to unpick our history is not the right way forward and is not something we will focus our energies on”.

The German president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, recently expressed “shame” for the colonial atrocities his country inflicted on Tanzania and in 2021 Germany officially acknowledged committing genocide during its occupation of Namibia and announced financial aid worth more than £940m.

Delegates said they felt buoyed by evidence of growing willingness to accept the need to pay reparations – citing Glasgow University’s promise to pay £20m to atone for its historical links to the transatlantic slave trade, the Church of England’s pledge of £100m to “address past wrongs” after its investment portfolio was found to have historic links to the transportation of enslaved people, and also the new Heirs of Slavery movement, formed by descendants of some of Britain’s wealthiest enslavers, which supports the call for reparatory justice.

Delegates visited Elmina Castle on Friday, a major European slave-trading post in Ghana where enslaved people were held before boarding ships to the Caribbean, Brazil and North America.

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