United Nations officials are continuing calls for reparations for Africans and people of African descent in an effort to render justice.
During its International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the U.N.’s leader advocated for reparations for slavery, deeming it essential to combat systemic racism.
“We call for reparatory justice frameworks to help overcome generations of exclusion and discrimination,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in a March 25 statement, according to a NBC News.
Guterres continued: “We appeal for the space and necessary conditions for healing, repair and justice. Descendants of enslaved Africans and people of African descent are still fighting for equal rights and freedoms around the world.”
The announcement followed a U.N. report released last September, which stated that no country had comprehensively accounted for the past or addressed the contemporary legacy of the violent displacement of an estimated 25 million to 30 million people from Africa over more than 400 years, as reported by Reuters.
The UN report proposed slavery reparations as a means to compensate for harmful acts against enslaved Africans.
The report stated, “under international human rights law, compensation for any economically assessable damage, as appropriate and proportional to the gravity of the violation and the circumstances of each case, may also constitute a form of reparations.”
