CARICOM prepared to take Britain to International Court over reparations matter

CARICOM is warning that it is prepared to take Britain to the International Court of Justice if the country still refuses to address the controversial matter of reparations.

The announcement comes a week after Barbados Prime Minister Freundel Stuart sent a formal letter of complaint to Britain on behalf of CARICOM.

The letter called on London to formally acknowledge the region’s demands for payment for the transatlantic slave trade.

CARICOM has said it will not release the contents of the letter until there is a reply by the British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Last October, on an official visit to Jamaica, Prime Minister Cameron acknowledged the wounds of slavery run very deep, but avoided speaking on the issue of reparation as he addressed a joint sitting of the Parliament.

But former Jamaica prime minister P.J. Patterson criticised Cameron and accused him of seeking to trivialise and diminish the significance of 300 years of British enslavement of Africans.