France has abstained in a UN vote declaring the African slave trade as the most serious crime against humanity at the end of March because it “refuses to create a hierarchy between crimes against humanity,” its foreign minister told AFP on Friday.
During a two-day official visit to Lomé, Jean-Noël Barrot also said he “pleaded” for the lifting of the suspension of France 24 and Radio France Internationale in Togo. This was the first visit by a French foreign minister to this West African country since 2002.
“If we abstained on this resolution, it is because we refuse to create a hierarchy between crimes against humanity, to compete the sufferings that these abominations and crimes continue to cause today,” said Jean-Noël Barrot. But “it is essential, if we want to build a common future, to be able to do this work of memory and truth about our past, in its positive aspects as well as in its darkest aspects,” he said.
Resolution carried by Ghanaian president
The resolution, adopted at the end of March with 123 votes in favor, 3 against (United States, Israel, Argentina), and 52 abstentions (including the United Kingdom and European Union member states), declares “the trade of Africans reduced to slavery and racial slavery of Africans” as “the most serious crimes against humanity,” condemning this “most inhumane and persistent injustice committed against humanity.” The text was carried by Ghanaian president John Mahama, whose country was the first on the continent to gain independence in 1957. Transatlantic slavery organized the trade of millions of people from West and Central Africa.
The resolution calls on states to engage in a process of justice to redress the wrongs of the past, including formal apologies, compensation for the descendants of victims, policies to combat racism, and the restitution of looted cultural and spiritual assets.
