ABUJA – The U.N. General Assembly’s resolution on Wednesday declaring the trafficking of enslaved Africans “the gravest crime against humanity” and calling for reparations is being widely welcomed across Africa and among advocates of restorative justice and slave descendants.
At the same time, questions are swirling over what the resolution means and what reparations could look like.
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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.
Here's what to know about the U.N. resolution:
Ghana pushed for the resolution for 'moral awareness'
Ghana pushed for the resolution that also urged “the prompt and unhindered restitution” of cultural items — including artworks, monuments, museum pieces, documents and national archives — to their countries of origin without charge.
Ghana foreign affairs minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa said after the resolution: “It recognizes that even within (its) complexity, there are moments in history that stand apart ... To acknowledge this is not to diminish any other history; it is to deepen our collective moral awareness.”
Although General Assembly resolutions are not legally binding, they are an important reflection of world opinion and are often referenced as the legal framework for causes.
In this case, the decision “marks an important step toward truth, justice and healing,” the African Union said in a statement.
Why some countries opposed and abstained from the resolution
A total of 123 member states voted in favor of the resolution, with three votes against it from Argentina, Israel and the United States. The United Kingdom and all 27 members of the European Union were among the 52 abstentions.
Speaking before the vote, deputy U.S. ambassador Dan Negrea said while the U.S. opposes the past wrongdoing of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and all other forms of slavery, it “does not recognize a legal right to reparations for historical wrongs that were not illegal under international law at the time they occurred.”
France through Sylvain Fournel, legal adviser for its U.N. mission, argued that the resolution “seems to establish a hierarchy among crimes against humanity,” an outcome that gives rise to “serious legal difficulties and runs the risk of creating a competition against historic tragedies.”
Africans and slave descendants have lauded the resolution
The U.N. resolution is “an answer to the prayers of our kidnapped, oppressed and murdered ancestors,” said Erieka Bennett, the founder of the Diaspora African Forum, a Ghana-based organization that connects people of African descent with their roots in Africa.
“This vote will energize our collective resolve to continue the fight for the dignity of African people and the liberation of our Motherland from the stranglehold of Western domination,” she added.
Nadege Anelka, a travel agent from the French overseas territory of Martinique in the Caribbean, moved to Benin and later became a citizen under a 2024 law granting citizenship to those who can trace their lineage to the slave trade.
She described Wednesday’s resolution as “fantastic news” even if it does mean much for her at this stage. “Having returned to Benin, I already feel like I have undergone my 'journey of reparations',” said Anelka, 58.
Gilles Olakounle Yabi, founder of WATHI, the West Africa Citizen Think Tank, said the resolution is “symbolic” coming at a time when not many are eager to acknowledge the cost of slavery.
However, Yabi said, the votes against the resolution and abstentions indicate that "it’s still not so clear that people recognize the immensity of the crimes that were committed.”
How should reparations be paid?
At a reparations summit in Ghana in 2023, participants from across the world tried to answer that by establishing a Global Reparation Fund to push for financial compensation as reparations, although with no clear modalities.
However, as recently as a few years ago, Americans, for instance, viewed the prospect of reparations mostly negatively. A Pew Research Center survey conducted in 2021 found that only about 3 in 10 U.S. adults said descendants of people enslaved in the U.S. should be repaid in some way, such as given land or money.
Some activists have said reparations should go beyond direct financial payments to also include developmental aid for countries, the return of colonized resources and the systemic correction of oppressive policies and laws.
Efforts being made in the form of reparations must address “justice for those communities who have suffered from this abject, inhuman and serious practice,” said Elkory Sneiba with SOS Esclaves, anti-slavery group in Mauritania.
Beverly Ochieng, a Senegal-based analyst at Control Risks Group, said it's unlikely Western governments will set aside funds to actually pay for slavery.
“Some will argue that they have tried to develop former colonies and countries they exploited,” Ochieng said.
Olivette Otele, Distinguished Research Professor of the Legacies and Memory of Slavery at SOAS, University of London, once wrote that advocates for reparations “hardly ever" seek only money. According to her, "their work is grounded in an understanding that the social, the political and the economic are bound together and must be addressed together, creating the possibility of a better world."
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Associated Press writers Mark Banchereau and Monika Pronczuk contributed to the reporting.