A resolution adopted by the UN General Assembly declared the transatlantic slave trade and the associated system of racialised chattel enslavement to be the gravest crime against humanity, a text that saw the UK and Ukraine abstain alongside 51 other nations, mostly European countries, as the measure passed with 123 votes in favour and only three countries, Argentina, Israel, and the United States, voting against.
The resolution emphasised that “claims for reparations represent a concrete step toward remedy.”
Funny how the UK, which got rich off the whole operation, suddenly found itself unable to pick a side, except to side with silence.
Of course, the US, Israel, and Argentina voted no — they are shameless. The shameless Americans also said the UN “was not founded to advance narrow specific interests and agendas” while arguing that reparations for historical wrongs are not legally owed because such crimes “were not illegal under international law at the time they occurred.”
Well, Rubio is practically calling out loud for re-colonization, so the USA’s no vote makes perfect sense.
UK abstention
Diane Abbott, Member of Parliament and the Mother of the House, shared the news of Britain’s abstention
Britain abstained. https://t.co/gHqzMyAmTV
— Diane Abbott (@HackneyAbbott) March 26, 2026
MP Bell Ribeiro-Addy said the UK’s abstention put it at odds with the global majority.
UN Delegates just voted to recognise the Transatlantic slave trade as a crime against humanity. Britain abstained.
This refusal to support this motion only places our government more at odds with the global majority.
The call for reparatory justice is only getting louder.
— Bell Ribeiro-Addy MP (@BellRibeiroAddy) March 25, 2026
Ben Norton criticised the West’s refusal to condemn slavery.
The West refused to condemn slavery in a UN General Assembly vote denouncing the transatlantic slave trade as “the gravest crime against humanity”.
Europe abstained.
Just 3 countries voted against it: the US, Israel, and Argentina.
More info here: https://t.co/ySFuXcylBr pic.twitter.com/gLOKBaCRLw
— Ben Norton (@BenjaminNorton) March 26, 2026
Meanwhile, GB News ran with a sensationalist headline.
UN votes for Britain to give up trillions of pounds in ‘slavery reparations’ handoutshttps://t.co/GPBtPRAXuI
— GB News (@GBNEWS) March 26, 2026
The new story quoted a Foreign Office spokesperson saying:
The UK’s position on reparations is clear – we will not pay them.
GB News was also cross that the UN “did not note Britain’s role in ending the slave trade, freeing 800,000 slaves, abolishing the trade entirely in 1807, and throughout most of the British Empire under the Slavery Abolition Act 1833.”
Maybe we should ask GB News to read Scholar Jason Hickel, who has written extensively on reparations, on the UK’s role in ending slavery.
He has also recently contributed to five case studies covering damages from slavery, conflict-related sexual violence, climate change, racial injustice, and structural adjustment.
I’m excited to announce this new dossier on reparations, published in the BMJ Global Health. Five case studies covering damages related to slavery, conflict-related sexual violence, climate change, racial injustice and structural adjustment. https://t.co/MaTBKffHG2 pic.twitter.com/uI3pPKGCwI
— Jason Hickel (@jasonhickel) March 24, 2026
Featured image via Twitter
By The Canary
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“West refuses to condemn slavery” is NOT what happened here. They refused to say that the transatlantic slave trade was the “gravest crime against humanity” in history.
Which may have been true (due to its scale) but ultimately subjective, you could consider many of the other genocides out there the “worst” depending on how you score it.
The Atlantic Slave Trade is the blueprint of and the initial impetus for a huge amount of racialized violence that happens nowadays, I really don’t think you can say the Atlantic Slave Trade is arguably on the level of other Genocides since other Genocides did not establish the power structures that still largely shape the world and enforce structures of violence and inequality globally to this very day.
There is NO modern capitalism without the Triangle Trade, PERIOD. The Atlantic Slave Trade and the Industrial Revolution are part of the same process of dehumanization.
