EU and CELAC leaders held a two-day summit in Brussels this week.
On Tuesday, the EU acknowledged Europe’s slave-trading past caused “untold suffering” to millions of people and suggested reparations for a “crime against humanity”.
Reparations for slavery are gaining popularity worldwide.
Ralph Gonsalves, the prime minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines and CELAC’s president, said he wanted the summit’s final statement to include language on “historical legacies of native genocide and enslavement of African bodies” and “reparatory justice” on Monday.
EU and CELAC “profoundly” grieved the “untold suffering inflicted on millions of men, women and children as a result of the transatlantic slave trade” one paragraph stated.
“Appalling tragedies… not only because of their abhorrent barbarism but also in terms of their magnitude” were slavery and the transatlantic slave trade. “Crime against humanity” was slavery.
The CELAC’s joint statement cited the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) 10-point compensation proposal, which calls on European nations to apologize for slavery.
The idea calls for a repatriation scheme to allow individuals to move to Africa and European support to address public health and economic concerns. Also, debt discharge.
The plan said that the CARICOM reparations committee “sees the persistent racial victimisation of the descendants of slavery and genocide as the root cause of their suffering today”.
Ernesto is a senior journalist with the St. Vincent Times. Having worked in the media for 16 years, he focuses on local and international issues. He has written for the New York Times and reported for the BBC during the La Soufriere eruptions of 2021.