Browne unfazed by push-back on reparations

DR AMERY BROWNE, Minister of Foreign and Caricom Affairs, is undaunted by the negative signals coming from the United Kingdom regarding calls by Caribbean leaders for slavery reparations voiced at the Commonwealth heads meeting in Samoa.

Practised on an industrial scale, for 400 years the Transatlantic Slave Trade consumed 12-20 million African men, women and children whose labour created wealth for their enslavers. Caricom leaders' calls for reparations have not found favour so far at CHOGM.

Both British monarch King Charles III and UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer have taken a line that the past is the past, despite its horrors.

Without saying the word slavery, Charles said, "I understand, from listening to people across the Commonwealth, how the most painful aspects of our past continue to resonate.

"It is vital, therefore, that we understand our history, to guide us to make the right choices in the future."

He called for a right way to address inequalities in access to opportunity, education, skills training, employment, health and the planet, and urged all to reject the language of division.

Charles said, "None of us can change the past.

"But we can commit, with all our hearts to learning its lessons and to finding creative ways to right inequalities that endure."

Starmer, a former human rights attorney who had briefly worked in Trinidad before heading the UK Crown Prosecution Service, did not support monetary reparations but other types of support to small nations, he said in a recent BBC interview.

"I think we should be clear from the outset that the slave trade, the slave practice, was abhorrent."

He acknowledged the issue mattered hugely to many of the countries represented at the CHOGM. "The question then is, where do we go from there?

"Now my posture, if you like, is that we should be forward-looking, that we should look at what are today's challenges in this group of countries represented here today." Based on talks before and during the conference, Starmer said the major challenges voiced at CHOGM were climate resilience and how to improve trade between member countries.

Starmer said, "My posture if you like, my focus, is on the forward look, not the sort of backward look." He again said the slave trade was abhorrent.

"We can't change our history but we should certainly talk about our history." He said apologies have already been made for the slave trade.

Newsday asked Browne if Caricom ministers felt deflated by the stance of the British leadership.

Browne replied via WhatsApp. "Those of us who are involved in the fight for reparatory justice must anticipate push-back from the systems that have benefited and continue to benefit from the legacy of chattel slavery and colonial exploitation.

"The status quo always seeks to protect itself and to potentiate its continued existence."

However, Browne said Caricom members were clear-eyed on the importance of advancing the reparations agenda at all appropriate fora. Where better than in the Commonwealth system, which shares common ties and a history significantly derived from that same legacy, he mulled?

"I have continued to strategically work with fellow foreign ministers to make inroads through and around the barriers that were put in place, and the Prime Minister has been doing the same at the higher level with his ongoing discussions amongst the Heads.

"It is a point of pride that Trinidad and Tobago is contributing robustly to this priority item on Caricom's agenda.

"We shall eventually prevail as our principles are clear and our cause is just."

He said Dr Rowley was respected as one of the key leaders on this and other matters within the Commonwealth family.

"It makes a big difference when you stand on the side of truth," Browne concluded.