A/HRC/45/47
slavery, resistance and abolitions; 49 the Working Group of Experts on People of African
Descent; and a limited-edition, leather-bound volume on history, memory and heritage. The
publications are generally available in English, French and Spanish, and have been
distributed widely through field offices and at OHCHR events.
58.
OHCHR has also produced a CD-ROM compiling documentation related to the
Decade, audiovisual materials and training materials, and is stepping up its social media
presence about the Decade.
K.
Accountability and reparatory justice
59.
In the human rights framework, justice and accountability are vital elements of
reparation and alleviating harm. Moreover, reparatory justice has been part of the thinking
and dialogue in the international community in respect of people of African descent at least
since the adoption of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action, which stresses that
slavery and the slave trade, including the transatlantic slave trade, are among the sources,
causes, forms and contemporary manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia
and related intolerance.50
60.
Under the justice pillar of the programme of activities for the Decade, States should
take further measures to ensure justice and honour the memory of the victims of these
tragedies by, inter alia, acknowledging the untold suffering and evils inflicted on millions of
men, women and children as a result of slavery, the slave trade, the transatlantic slave trade,
colonialism, apartheid, genocide and other past tragedies. It is noteworthy that some States
have taken the initiative to apologize and have paid reparation, where appropriate, for grave
and massive violations committed. Truth-telling processes in addition to such steps are
essential. States that have not yet taken comprehensive steps towards justice, reconciliation
and healing are called upon to do so in order to find some way to contribute to the restoration
of human dignity of victims. In that vein, all States concerned are called upon to take
appropriate and effective measures to halt and reverse the lasting consequences of those
practices, bearing in mind their moral obligations. The international community and its
members are invited to honour the memory of the victims of the above-mentioned tragedies
with a view to closing those dark chapters in history and as a means of reconciliation and
healing.51
61.
In the years since the adoption of the Decade, there has been a slowly growing general
acceptance about the timeliness of considering issues of reparations and reparatory justice.
In many countries, discussions and exchanges of views have taken place in communities of
African descent and among the general public, and national and public discourses have
emerged on the issue of reparations and people of African descent.
62.
Additionally, regional organizations such as the African Union and the CARICOM
Reparations Commission have been studying and making proposals about reparatory justice
for slavery, the slave trade and the enslavement of people of African descent. On 26 March
2019, for the first time, the European Parliament adopted a resolution on the fundamental
rights of people of African descent in Europe, in which it stated that the terms “Afrophobia”,
“Afri-phobia” and “anti-black racism” referred to a specific form of racism that correlated to
historically repressive structures of colonialism and the transatlantic slave trade, as
recognized by the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights. Furthermore,
enslavement, forced labour, racial apartheid, massacres and genocides in the context of
European colonialism and the transatlantic slave trade remained largely unrecognized and
unaccounted at an institutional level in the States members of the European Union.52
49
50
51
52
12
Ali Moussa Iye, Nelly Schmidt and Paul E. Lovejoy, eds., Slavery, Resistance and Abolitions: A
Plural Perspective (2020).
A/CONF.189/12 and Corr.1, chap. I, paras. 13–14 and 33–35.
General Assembly resolution 69/16, annex, para. 17 (i)–(k).
See www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/B-8-2019-0212_EN.html.
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