[A-List] Jamaica: slavery reparations claims

[Michael Keaney]

Rastafarians seek billions in slavery reparations
STEVENSON JACOBS, Kingston
The Herald, September 08 2004

A coalition of Rastafarian groups in Jamaica said yesterday it wants to go
the United Nations to pressure European countries to pay billions of pounds
in slavery reparations to followers of the faith.

The Rastafarian Nation in Jamaica says European countries formerly involved
in the slave trade, especially Britain, should pay £72.5bn to resettle
500,000 Jamaican Rastafarians in Africa. "It's a matter of human rights and
justice for a crime that was committed 300 years ago and whose repercussions
are still being felt today," said Barbara Makeda Blake-Hannah, a member of
the group.

Officials at the British High Commission in Kingston were not immediately
available for comment.

Last year, the Queen rejected a similar claim by Jamaican Rastafarians,
saying that Britain could not be held accountable for wrongs committed in
past centuries.-AP