A growing number of African and Caribbean nations are moving forward with their push to hold those responsible for the trans-Atlantic slave trade to account, calling on those involved to pay reparations and take part in a Nuremberg-esque tribunal.
Support for the proposal has grown since it was first formally brought up by the United Nations Permanent Forum on People of African Descent last year.
According to Reuters, while it has not been determined exactly how far-reaching the tribunal would be, the UN suggested that it should take into consideration potential reparations for a number of evils inflicted upon African people, namely enslavement, apartheid, genocide, and colonialism.
Before any tribunal can be set up, however, proponents must drum up support among UN member states, something that even the most fervent advocates of the plan have admitted will not be an easy task.
While it is widely agreed that something must be done to right the wrongs of the past, there has been disagreement when it comes to exactly how perpetrating nations should go about doing so.
During the Nuremberg Trials, those responsible for the Holocaust were alive and able to answer for their crimes, however in the case of the trans-Atlantic slave trade, the human offenders and victims are long dead.
As a result, some nations have questioned to whom reparations would be paid, and from whom the money would be taken.
In a statement to Reuters, for example, the British Foreign Ministry said it would rather focus on solving "today's challenges."
Nonetheless, the idea of establishing a tribunal has received support from many nations from which slaves were taken and to where they were brought, including Nigeria and Grenada, as well as allies.
While UN General Secretary Antonio Guterres stopped short of endorsing the tribunal's creation, he called for "reparatory justice frameworks to help overcome generations of exclusion and discrimination."
During the trans-Atlantic slave trade, over 12.5 million Africans were bought, sold, and transported all over the world by European nations and their colonies.
