Delegates at a reparations summit in Ghana agreed Thursday to establish a Global Reparation Fund to push for overdue compensation for millions of Africans enslaved centuries ago during the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
The Accra Reparation Conference adds to the growing demands for reparations after about 12 million Africans were forcefully taken by European nations from the 16th to the 19th century and enslaved on plantations that built wealth at the price of misery.
Centuries after the end of the slave trade, people of African descent around the world continue “to be victims of systemic racial discrimination and racialized attacks,” concluded a recent report by a special UN forum which supported reparations as “a cornerstone of justice in the 21st century.”
Compensations are based on “moral and legal rights and dignity of the people,” said Ambassador Amr Aljowailey—strategic adviser to the deputy chairman of the African Union (AU) Commission—who read out the resolution titled The Accra Proclamation.
In addition to the Global Reparation Fund, which will be championed by a committee of experts set up by the AU Commission in collaboration with African nations, “a special envoy will engage in campaigns as well as litigation and judicial efforts,” said Aljowailey.
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