UK was ‘vehement’ slavery reparations should not be on Commonwealth summit agenda
Özet haber: British prime minister has now agreed to structured dialogue on reparatory justice but issue remains off formal Chogm agenda
British prime minister has now agreed to structured dialogue on reparatory justice but issue remains off formal Chogm agenda
British officials reportedly insisted that discussions of reparations for slavery should not be on the agenda of the Commonwealth leaders’ summit in Antigua and Barbuda – and even warned that Andy Burnham would not attend the meeting if the subject was formally included, according to a leading Caribbean political figure.
Ralph Gonsalves, a former prime minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines and a senior figure in the reparatory justice movement Repair Campaign, welcomed Britain’s decision to enter structured dialogue on reparations, but said the UK had come “kicking and screaming” to the conversation.
Currently, slavery reparations is not on the official agenda of the Commonwealth Heads of Government (Chogm) summit, which begins on Sunday.
Trade, climate resilience and finance, sustainable debt, democracy and investment in opportunities for young people are among the stated priorities for the 56-nation bloc spanning Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and the Americas, the Pacific and Europe.
“My understanding from informed circles is that Britain was vehement not to have the matter on the agenda. The British officials – and in that regard they were joined by the Canadian officials – were even raising the prospect that if it is on the agenda the prime minister of Britain wouldn’t go,” Gonsalves told the Guardian.
“They also started to circulate this untruth that India didn’t want it on the agenda, but that was not so at all. India was very supportive at the UN general assembly resolution on March 25th, 2026. So they were spreading this false word about India.”
Gonsalves said that the relentless campaign by Caribbean nations, amplified by a growing regional and global reparations movement, has propelled reparatory justice to the heart of the political conversation at the meeting.
“Because of what happened at the UN, because of what happened in Africa, what happened in the Caribbean, and all the work which is taking place in Britain itself too, inside of the British parliament, inside of the British Labour party, both in the Commons and the House of Lords, it is an issue which you can’t duck any more,” he said.
He added: “The danger of not putting it formally on the agenda is what we see happening now, that everybody who could have foreseen, whether or not it’s formally on the agenda, even the nature of how the discussions take place at the Commonwealth, and certainly in the retreats, it would have been raised.”
Gonsalves said while the actual structured dialoguewas unlikely to happen at Chogm, it was expected that when the leaders met in their private retreat, the format and details of the dialogue would be discussed.
He said: “The British government, they’re coming, kicking and screaming to the table of structured dialogue. But at least they’re coming.”
