[Caribbean\Reparations]
Jamaica Gleaner: “She said there was need for “a written and clear apology to say, ‘we were wrong, we will not do it again’, and more important, we must pay recompense for what was done.”
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Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley and Caribbean countries to European countries: you owe us Reparations along with an apology.
Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley says Caribbean countries affected by crimes of native genocide and African enslavement are calling for more than an apology from some European states and commercial enterprises for their role in the Atlantic slave trade and the practice of chattel slavery.
“I do not know how we can go further unless there is a reckoning first and foremost that places an apology and an acknowledgement that wrong was done, and that successive centuries saw the destruction of wealth and the destruction of people in a way that must never happen for any society, to any race in any part of this world again,” she said as she participated in a regional virtual discussion on the topic: From Apology to Action – CARICOM’s Call for Reparatory Justice.
The event was organised by the CARICOM Reparations Commission, and Mottley, who last week was replaced as the chair of the 15-member regional integration movement, noted the “unbelievable failure of countries to first acknowledge that with an apology, and not that something wrong happened”.
She said there was need for “a written and clear apology to say, ‘we were wrong, we will not do it again’, and more important, we must pay recompense for what was done. That is the first step of walking the walk.”
For the rest of this Jamaica Gleaner story log on to:http://jamaica-gleaner.com/article/news/20200707/caribbean-countries-want-more-apology-slavery
