The Barbados Attorney-General has described as “offensive” the decision by delegates to a Pan African conference on racism to exclude non-blacks.
The African and African Descendants World Conference Against Racism currently being held in Barbados had on Thursday voted for a resolution brought by a British delegation, which called for non-blacks to be excluded from the six-day conference. A counter resolution allowing the participation of non-blacks and forwarded by a French-speaking Caribbean group was not voted on yesterday. Nor have the non-black delegates left. The African Cultural Development Association from Guyana has sent a large delegation to the conference.
The Nation newspaper yesterday reported the Attorney-General and Minister of Home Affairs Mia Mottley as telling the organisers on Thursday that she hoped they would rescind “the offensive” decision to expel whites from the conference and hoped that the participants in the conference allow the participation of all persons of whatever race wishing to make a contribution to the very important issues in which all societies have a stake.
In the statement on the government’s position Mottley said the “Barbados government does not support segregation in any form or racism in any disguise.”
The statement said that as a government, Barbados supported the principle of this conference at the outset as a legitimate follow-up to the Durban World Conference Against Racism, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
As host country, she said the government provided logistical support to facilitate the process of dialogue among non-governmental organisations from all the regions of the world.
While noting that the government was not a participant in the conference, Mottley said that the expulsion on Wednesday had compelled it to make its position clear, the Nation reported.
The Barbados Government, she said was unequivocally opposed to any resolution seeking to separate persons on the basis of race or ethnic origins. She said “we have fought too long as a nation against this type of injustice from whatever source it emanates.”
The government and people of Barbados, she said jealously guard the reputation, which they earned in modern times as a vibrant, pluralistic, multi-racial society built on tolerance and respect for racial, religious and cultural diversity.
At the resumption of the conference yesterday, the Nation reported last night that all members of the delegations who supported the motion of exclusion were tight-lipped on the issue.
The delegates at the forefront of the counter-resolution are from Martinique, Guadeloupe, Haiti, St Maarten and French Guiana.
Meanwhile delegates to the conference are asking the United Nations to explain why a US$10,000 offer it made to the conference was withdrawn.
The delegates also wanted to know why the UN could not totally fund the historic conference.
Chairman of the Central Organising Committee Dr Jewel Crawford told a plenary session that the organisers had appealed for US$1 million and was told the U.N. had no money for the conference. Later it made a commitment of $10,000, which was subsequently withdrawn.
Some 550 participants from around the world had initially registered for the conference.
The conference ends tomorrow and Crawford said it would be expected to prepare a report, which would form the Bridgetown Protocol.
Discussions centre on reparations, globalisation, judicial reform, religion, art and culture, media, labour, economic development, education, health and environment, youth, gender and decolonisation.