Excellency Mr. Minister Delegate, Minister Yackoley JOHNSON
Excellencies, Ambassadors, Permanent Representatives, and Heads of Diplomatic Missions accredited to the United Nations in Geneva,

Excellency Ms. Ann-Kathrye Lassègue, Coordinator of the CARICOM Ambassadorial Group,

Excellency Mr. Volker Turk, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights,

Excellency Mr. Jurg Lauber, President of the United Nations Human Rights Council

Ladies and Gentlemen, Leaders of African and Diaspora Civil Society Organizations,

Distinguished Guests,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

First of all, I would like to thank you for your remarkable presence at this high-level event, which demonstrates your interest in the cause of the peoples of Africa and demonstrates your commitment to continuing the fight for the legitimate interests of our continent, including the most despised.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Waging this fight for Africa, especially in these troubled times marked by complex issues, requires boldness and inventiveness. The challenges of the moment require us to be more vigilant than ever before and not to back down in the face of adversity or contemptuous silence. They also require us to reinvent ourselves in a more proactive and decisive role in the shared quest for listening, justice, and respect.

Our fight is for Africa. It is against no one, except those who refuse to do justice. Our peoples thirst for justice, a justice that has been slow to manifest itself for centuries. Their humanity was denied and auctioned off during the transatlantic slave trade; their identity was captured and relocated elsewhere during deportations; their bodies, property, and cultures were bruised, despoiled, and trampled underfoot during colonization. Everything has happened in Africa, from the most ignoble to the most cruel, except justice.

Hence this cry from the peoples of Africa, which I echo here at the Palais des Nations, the temple of international law: JUSTICE FOR AFRICA NOW!

Ladies and gentlemen,

The world order established in the aftermath of the Second World War has kept the centuries of injustice suffered by Africa and its peoples outside its protective walls. The cries for justice of the peoples of Africa have remained unheard for too long within these protected spaces and within a collective conscience lulled by denial and contempt.

At a time when the world order is being reshaped, it is more than urgent to make Africa’s suffering voice heard, as well as the most demanding expectations of our peoples.

Since destinies have been shattered by force, reparation must be ensured through the law.

And who better than the United Nations to finally bring justice to Africa through the law?

Excellencies,

Ladies and gentlemen,

My country, Togo, a nation committed to peace, justice, and understanding among peoples, has clearly understood that in the face of injustice, it takes courage to begin to denounce it, the will to listen, and a concerted framework to address it. My country also, and above all, understands that our shared institutions, the African Union and the United Nations, cannot do everything, especially when the impetus does not come from individual states. 

This is why, under the leadership of His Excellency Mr. Faure Essozimna GNASSINGBE, President of the Council of the Togolese Republic, we have begun to lay the foundations of a legal framework by initiating a decision adopted by the Conference of Heads of State and Government of the African Union, on February 16, 2025 in Addis Ababa, unanimously by its members, on the qualification of slavery, deportation and colonization as crimes against humanity and genocide against the peoples of Africa.

This historic decision, which follows the 2021 decision that led to the adoption by the African Union of the 2021-2031 Decade of African Roots and the African Diaspora, is the result of a steadfast and resolute commitment by the Togolese government, convinced that crimes and injustices against Africa must no longer be ignored, and worse, remain unredressed.

We are, indeed, deeply convinced that justice is the best cement for overcoming the wounds of the past and building a future filled with understanding and harmony among the peoples of the world. Postponing the timetable for dialogue and reparations is to store up the resentments and misunderstandings of the past for future generations.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Historical injustices must no longer be seen as an exclusively African cause. These crimes have wounded humanity at its very core. They reveal the failure of the collective conscience, which has failed to protect, denounce, or redress the ignominy inflicted on Africa and its peoples. Denouncing them and demanding just reparations must no longer be the sole preserve of the peoples of Africa.

This is why I urge the United Nations and all nations committed to peace and justice to listen to the inconsolable voices of Africa and to undertake concrete initiatives without delay to demonstrate their refusal to prolong the silence on these unspeakable crimes and, above all, to offer a path to legal redress to the peoples of Africa who still bear the scars of this painful past.

The international community’s indulgence and leniency toward those historically responsible for and beneficiaries of these horrific and intolerable crimes create fertile ground for the resurgence of a superiority complex, impunity, and invulnerability to international norms. This also creates among the peoples of Africa the impression of a hierarchy of victims at the international level: the gravity of the act and the resulting shock seem to be assessed in light of the victim’s racial or geographic origin.

This impression of double standards tarnishes the image of international institutions that are supposed to guarantee justice and fairness for all.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Faced with these legitimate impressions, taking strong and courageous initiatives now to vigorously respond to our peoples’ thirst for justice seems to me to be the right path to enable multilateral institutions to restore their credibility and, above all, to reestablish our countries’ shattered confidence in the ideal that these institutions, so useful in these troubled times, are supposed to embody.

Therefore, I call on everyone’s mobilization and a heightened sense of responsibility from our shared institutions to promptly initiate a draft resolution that would allow us to move beyond the Africanization of the cause of reparations and toward a comprehensive, inclusive, and concerted process of justice and reparation for the peoples of Africa through the law.

Thank you