RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - India's prime minister endorses call for Britain to pay reparations for colonial rule

"Yes, countries like Britain benefited a lot from the world order, or the disorder,
that existed during their imperial era, but should they apologise for being stronger
than the societies they conquered?"

The logic here is so crooked that it does not merit an answer.

By implication, the victims of Boko Haram, Hitler's Germany, apartheid South Africa, and all the rest, should be
blamed for not being strong enough.

China, your reference in this case, continues to seek apologies and compensation from Japan.

Africa has numerous structures and artifacts of its own to be proud of and need not
envy Europe or its bloody history.

The precedent of reparations has been set, and India
has every right to make its claim or request- irrespective of the illogical argumentation of an
unknown soldier with no name.





Professor Gloria Emeagwali
History Department
CCSU. New Britain. CT 06050
africahistory.net
vimeo.com/user5946750/videos
Gloria Emeagwali's Documentaries on
Africa and the African Diaspora

________________________________
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Charles [mr.persona@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, July 26, 2015 5:52 AM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - India's prime minister endorses call for Britain to pay reparations for colonial rule

Interesting, but the challenge is where does one draw the line? 100 years? 200 years? 500 years? Yes, countries like Britain benefited a lot from the world order, or the disorder, that existed during their imperial era, but should they apologise for being stronger than the societies they conquered? Evidence would suggest that had India or Africa been that strong they probably would have gone to colonise others in the same way. This is what history has been about and while the rules have changed today, the game is still on. Probably Britain should apologise for the barbaric and senseless sinking of the Spanish Armada when it was attacked during the reign of Elizabeth the first?

For those who come from developing nations, we might have a hangover with how history turned in our disfavour, (when we see the magnificence of the Chateau de Versailles, or the Buckingham Palace, or the many wonderful buildings scattered across Europe, don't we wish they were in our countries too?) but isn't it time we cut the cord and move on? The Chinese are building islands on the Ocean, building their first aircraft carrier and planning to take man to the moon ahead of Americans. The future beckons.

If an event happened after 1945 (i.e. the founding of the UN) probably one might have an argument (new age)(e.g. Mau Mau victims and Gurkha descendants), but if it happened before that the lesson we need to take is that being weak and defenseless has serious consequences. It is the lesson that even with all the history behind us Africans are yet to learn properly. Or we would not be as reckless as we are with our resources and development.

Charles.

On Sun, Jul 26, 2015 at 2:21 AM, Emeagwali, Gloria (History) <emeagwali@mail.ccsu.edu<mailto:emeagwali@mail.ccsu.edu>> wrote:
The Telegraph
Sunday 26, July 2015
India's prime minister endorses call for Britain to pay reparations for colonial rule
Narendra Modi supports impassioned Shashi Tharoor's call for colonial ruler Britain to make reparations to India


[http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02063/barney-henderson_2063034a.jpg]<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/journalists/barney-henderson/>

By Barney Henderson<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/journalists/barney-henderson/>

9:43PM BST 24 Jul 2015

"As far as I am concerned, the ability to acknowledge a wrong that has been done, to simply say sorry,

will go a far, far, far longer way than some percentage of GDP in the form of aid," he said.

"What is required, it seems to me, is accepting the principle that reparations are owed."



Mr Modi, however, did not say whether he backed Mr Tharoor's demand for an apology.

The British High Commission in Delhi declined to comment.



Mr Modi is due to visit Britain later this year. The dates of the trip have yet to be finalised.

Many in India want Britain to make amends for the wrongs committed during its colonial rule<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/8430899/David-Cameron-Britain-caused-many-of-the-worlds-problems.html>.

David Cameron had to face severe criticism<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/9876387/David-Camerons-India-trade-trip-why-we-owe-a-debt-to-India.html> during his last trip to India for not apologising

for the 1919 Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar, where hundreds of non-violent pro-independence

protesters were shot dead at the behest of Colonel Reginald Dyer.

The Prime Minister expressed regret for the massacre during a visit to Amritsar in 2013

and laid a wreath at a memorial, but Indian critics said it was not enough.


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