In Accra this June, the reparations debate moved from remembrance towards political architecture. Over three days, Ghana hosted the High-Level Consultative Conference on the “Next Steps” to the landmark United Nations resolution on the trafficking of enslaved Africans. The venues told their own story: technical deliberations at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a high-level session…
To implement the landmark UN slavery resolution, reparations should be defined as a framework for truth, responsibility, repair, reconciliation and global justice. Ghana recently hosted a conference on Africa’s next steps following the landmark United Nations (UN) resolution declaring the trafficking of African slaves as the ‘gravest crime against humanity.’ Ghana led the process to…
Reacting to the decision by Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger to deposit formal notifications of withdrawal from the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, Marceau Sivieude, Amnesty International’s Regional Director for West and Central Africa, said: “This decision by the governments of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger threatens to deny thousands of victims the…
President Joseph Nyuma Boakai has called on Africa and the international community to redefine the global conversation on reparations for the transatlantic slave trade, arguing that justice for one of history’s greatest crimes against humanity must extend far beyond monetary compensation to include truth-telling, institutional reform, cultural restoration, and reconciliation. Addressing the Two-day High-Level Consultative…
President Cyril Ramaphosa has renewed calls for reparations to address the enduring impact of colonialism and slavery on the African continent, arguing that meaningful redress must support development and economic justice. In his weekly newsletter marking Africa Month, President Ramaphosa said while the continent celebrates its unity and shared identity, the legacy of colonialism continues…
A United Nations resolution recognising the transatlantic slave trade as a crime against humanity has bolstered Namibian calls for justice regarding colonial-era genocide and reparations. Local subject experts say the vote is significant, not only for countries directly tied to the slave trade, but also for Namibia, where the effects of colonial violence, dispossession and…
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, has described reparatory justice for colonialism, enslavement and the trade in enslaved Africans as “key to dismantling systemic racism.” Speaking on Tuesday at the fifth session of the UN Permanent Forum on People of African Descent, he lauded the advances in racial justice and equality that…
The UN General Assembly’s landmark resolution is likely to be stymied by a world divided on how to right past wrongs. A Ghana-led resolution declaring the trafficking of enslaved Africans and racialised chattel enslavement the ‘gravest crime against humanity’ was adopted at the United Nations (UN) General Assembly on 25 March. Most countries (122) voted…
President John Dramani Mahama has urged the African Union (AU) to assert its demand for reparatory justice or risk never attaining the justice it seeks. “Reparatory justice will not be handed to us like political independence; it must be asserted, pursued and secured through determination and unity,” President Mahama, the AU Champion on Reparatory Justice,…
Accra, 19th December; In a landmark moment for the global reparations movement, President John Dramani Mahama of Ghana welcomed a special delegation of leading advocates and experts from across the African diaspora to align on a unified, intercontinental reparations agenda. The group, which comprises experts from Africa, the Caribbean, Europe, Latin America and the United…
