Ghana is set to table a resolution at the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday, March 25, 2026, formally declaring the Transatlantic Slave Trade the gravest crime against humanity.
This move would be the first comprehensive resolution on slavery in the UN’s 80-year history.
A press statement issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said President John Dramani Mahama will personally table the resolution, fulfilling a pledge he made during his address to the UN General Assembly last year.
The resolution, titled the Declaration of the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and Racialised Chattel Enslavement of Africans as the Gravest Crime Against Humanity, has been scheduled for consideration and adoption on March 25 observed internationally as the Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
Ghana is tabling the resolution in its capacity as African Union (AU) Champion on Reparations, working in collaboration with the Caribbean Community and Common Market and all people of African descent worldwide.
The resolution has been endorsed by the African Union.
The resolution seeks to formally declare the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and Racialised Chattel Enslavement of Africans as the Gravest Crime Against Humanity by reason of what it describes as the definitive break in world history, the scale, duration, systemic nature, brutality, and enduring consequences of the trade [consequences that continue to shape socio-economic realities and structural inequalities across the world today].
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the adoption of the resolution would preserve historical truth as a foundation for justice and reconciliation, and respond to the growing global call for meaningful engagement on reparatory justice, accountability, and healing.
The resolution also draws a direct line between the Transatlantic Slave Trade and present-day debt asymmetries, development gaps, climate vulnerability, and global financial governance, framing the naming of this historical reality not as a symbolic gesture but as the beginning of a reckoning with structural inequalities that persist to this day.
Ahead of the tabling, a solemn wreath laying ceremony will be held at the African Burial Ground in New York on March 24 at 8:00 am, followed by a High-Level Event on Reparatory Justice for the Trafficking of Enslaved Africans and Racialised Chattel Enslavement of Africans at UN Conference Room 3 at 10:00 am the same day.
Following the adoption of the resolution, Ghana said it would continue to advance multilateral efforts on reparatory justice within the framework of the African Union’s Decade of Action on Reparations and African Heritage, covering the period 2026 to 2036.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged all UN Member States to be counted on the right side of history and justice.
Officials available for interview include the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, Deputy Minister James Gyakye Quayson, and Special Envoy for Reparations Dr. Ekwow Spio-Garbrah.
Source: isd.gov.gh
