Un Adopts Landmark Resolution On Slavery Reparations

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) has adopted a draft resolution that unequivocally condemns the trafficking of enslaved Africans and the transatlantic slave trade as the most inhumane and enduring injustice against humanity. The resolution also seeks to recognise the profound and lasting impacts of the abhorrent regimes of slavery and colonialism, and emphasised that claims for reparations represented a concrete step towards remedying historical wrongs against Africans and people of African descent. Despite the adoption several western states could not support the text.

123 countries were in favour, 52 abstentions and three voting against the United States (US), Israel and Argentina.

Today, the @UN General Assembly has adopted a landmark Resolution : A/80/L.48 entitled “Declaration of the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and Racialised Chattel Enslavement of Africans as the Gravest Crime Against Humanity.” This Resolution marks a significant milestone in… pic.twitter.com/7c8Llpflg8 — African Union Mission to the UN (@AfricanUnionUN) March 25, 2026 The initiative was spearheaded by Ghana and the African Group that earlier explained the draft resolution was the result of a clear continental mandate taken at the highest levels of the African Union (AU).

Ghana President John Mahama says, “This current draft resolution is a result of months of consultation and consensus building by continental bodies, nations, experts, scholars and jurists with the sole aim of achieving a united front and grounding the final outcome in truth, compassion and moral conscience. Remembrance, education and dialogue.” Mahama says, “So today we come together in solemn solidarity to affirm truth and pursue a route to healing and reparative justice. The adoption of this resolution serves as a safeguard against forgetting.

It also challenges the enduring scars of slavery and so delegates on this beautiful day in March we’re called to stand on the right side of history.” ENSLAVED AFRICANS The resolution unequivocally condemns the trafficking of enslaved Africans as the most inhumane and enduring injustice against humanity. It emphasises that claims for reparations represent a concrete step towards remedying historical wrongs against African people and calls on member states to engage in good-faith dialogue on reparatory justice including a full and formal apology.

The resolution further demands for the prompt restitution of cultural properties, artefacts and archives, and request the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to produce a report on implementation during the GA’s 82nd session which begins in September next year. Guterres says, “The wounds run deep and often go unrecognised.

I have often said, the transatlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity that struck at the core of personhood, broke up families, and devastated communities.” He adds, To justify the unjustifiable, slavery’s proponents and beneficiaries constructed a racist ideology, turning prejudice into a pseudoscience. This perverse global order thrived because power acted without conscience.

We must use our power for better ends by rejecting the false narrative of racial difference and calling out the ugly lie of white supremacy.” UN condemns trafficking of enslaved Africans LEGAL PROBLEMS US Representative Ambassador Dan Negrea says the resolution’s legal problems are obvious. Negrea says, “This resolution is also unclear as to who the recipients of respiratory justice would be. The drafters and supporters of this resolution seem to believe it is them.

The United States strongly objects to the cynical usage of historical wrongs as a leverage point, in an attempt to reallocate modern resources to people and nations who are distantly related to the historical victims.” He says, “The United States would also like to express disappointment in the arbitrary historical perspective of the text. Trafficking in African slaves began long before the 15th century and sadly continued even after the 19th.

These dates were clearly selected for political reasons rather than historical accuracy.” CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY Some countries, mainly among western nations, also objected to what they viewed as an effort to rank crimes against humanity, pushing back at the notion that some atrocity crimes were less severe than others. Ghana’s Foreign Minister Samuel Ablakwa rejected that view in the assembly arguing that the resolution established a principled framework for reconciliation grounded in truth and that it reflected the broadest possible views of member states.

The non-binding text, while not adopted unanimously due to several legal and technical objections from European and other Western states, still passed on the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade, which is March 25.

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