King Charles Confirms Slavery Legacy Will Be Discussed at Commonwealth Summit
King Charles has confirmed that the legacy of slavery will be discussed at a Commonwealth summit, the gathering of leaders from the Commonwealth association of countries, as he begins a Caribbean tour. He said that Commonwealth heads of government, meeting in Antigua next week, will discuss matters relating to slavery's legacy, according to The Guardian.
The king arrived in the Bahamas on Tuesday to a ceremonial welcome. He then attended a youth rally at Clifford Park, the site where the Bahamas officially gained independence from British colonial rule in 1973. His nine-day tour also includes a solo state visit to Guyana, and it will end with him presiding over the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) hosted by Antigua and Barbuda.
Calls for reparations have grown ahead of the trip, Reuters reported. Reparations are payments or other forms of redress for historic wrongs. The king has been urged to support reparations talks at the summit, and he has been described as a "human brother" in that appeal. Protests over the monarchy's colonial legacy have coincided with the summit.
The king has spoken about slavery before. At the 2021 ceremony marking Barbados's transition to a republic, he described it as an "appalling atrocity" which "forever stains our history." In 2022, at the opening of a Commonwealth summit hosted by Rwanda, he said he was continuing to deepen his understanding of the enduring impact of slavery. On Reuters' account, he has also said the Commonwealth should confront slavery's injustices.
Not everyone has welcomed his remarks. The Bahamas National Reparations Committee said the king's comments on Tuesday fall short of what justice requires.
Public opinion in Britain is also divided. A poll by More in Common, published by the Repair Campaign, found that 40% of Britons supported a meeting on reparatory justice, while 19% were undecided. Support was higher among younger people, with 60% of those aged 18 to 24 and 51% of those aged 25 to 34 backing such a meeting. Among voters who backed Labour and the Liberal Democrats at the last election, 58% and 57% respectively were in favour. Ralph Gonsalves, a former prime minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines, is an elder of the Repair Campaign.
The king has said the Commonwealth should confront slavery's injustices, and the Antigua meeting is where leaders are expected to take up the subject next week.
