Belgium ordered to pay reparations for colonial-era kidnapping of mixed-race children

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THE BELGIUM government has been ordered by a court to pay reparations to five mixed-race women who were forcibly removed from their Black mothers in Congo during the colonial era. The women, who are now all in their 70s, were taken from their Black mothers when they were young children and placed in orphanages under a state policy. The Belgium court said the government had a “plan to systematically search for and abduct children born to a black mother and a white father”, according to the BBC. “Their abduction is an inhumane and persecutory act constituting a crime against humanity under the principles of international law,” the court said in a press statement. In 2019, the Belgium government first issued a formal apology for the brutal kidnapping thousands of mixed-race children from Congo between 1959 and 1962. “In the name of the federal government, I present my apologies to the metis of the Belgian colonial era and their families for the injustices and the sufferings they have endured,” Prime Minister Charles Michel told Parliament at the time. “I hope that this solemn moment will be an additional step toward an awareness and knowledge of this part of our national history.”...

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