Keir Starmer rejects calls for slavery reparations talks

The Atlantic slave trade saw millions of Africans enslaved and forced to work, especially on plantations in the Caribbean and the Americas, for centuries from around 1500.

The British government and monarchy were prominent participants in the trade, alongside other European nations.

The United Kingdom also played a key role in ending the trade through Parliament’s passage of a law to abolish slavery in 1833.

Reparations are widely recognized as compensation for something that has been deemed wrong or unjust and can take many forms.

In the run-up to this week’s summit, five MPs from Starmer’s Labor Party have been pushing for the issue of reparations for slavery to be discussed.

One of them, Clapham and Brixton Hill MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy, said it would be “wrong” not to address the issue at the summit.