Macron under pressure over reparatory justice for France’s role in slave trade

Demands grow for launch of formal discussion process on how country should address legacies of enslavement

Emmanuel Macron is under pressure to open discussions on reparatory justice for France’s role in hundreds of years of enslavement of African people as he makes a key speech on the legacy of slavery.

On Thursday the French president will celebrate the 25th anniversary of France becoming the first country in the world to recognise the slave trade and slavery as crimes against humanity in a 2001 law brought by Christiane Taubira, a leading MP from French Guiana.