ベルギー国王、コンゴの植民地支配に「遺憾の極み」表明

【ブリュッセルＡＦＰ＝時事】ベルギーのフィリップ国王は30日、自国によるコンゴ民主共和国の植民地支配がもたらした被害について、ベルギー国王として初めて「遺憾の極み」との思いを表明した。（写真は落書きされたレオポルド2世の像。ベルギー・ブリュッセルで）
　フィリップ国王は、コンゴの独立６０周年を記念して同国のフェリックス・チセケディ大統領に送った書簡の中で「過去の傷について、遺憾の極みと伝えたい。その傷の痛みは今日、私たちの社会に依然存在する差別によって呼び覚まされている」と記した。
　米国でアフリカ系のジョージ・フロイドさんが白人警官の拘束下で死亡した事件を受けて、ベルギーでも過去の植民地支配をめぐる議論が活発になっている。
　歴史学者らによると、現在のコンゴ民主共和国に当たる地域で、ベルギーのレオポルド２世（１８６５～１９０９年在位）が所有していたゴム園の労働者数百万人が、殺害されたり体を切断されたり、病気で亡くなったりしたという。
　フィリップ国王はレオポルド２世の名には触れなかったものの、当時「暴力的で残虐な行為があり、それが私たちの共通の記憶に重くのしかかっている」と述べ、「それに続く植民地時代（１９０８～６０年）も、苦痛と屈辱をもたらした」と認めた。
　フィリップ国王はあらゆる形態の人種差別に立ち向かっていくと表明し、植民地支配の記憶が静まるよう、ベルギー議会が提起したこの問題に対して反省を促していきたいと語った。
　ベルギーではここ数週間、レオポルド２世の複数の像が反人種差別抗議デモの参加者によってペンキをかけられたり倒されたりしており、像の撤去を求める請願運動も始まっている。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2020/07/01-13:12）

Belgium's King Philippe expressed his deepest regrets on Tuesday for the harm done during Belgian colonial rule in DR Congo, in a first for his country.
Philippe, who has reigned since 2013, made his remarks in a letter to the president of the Democratic Republic of Congo, Felix Tshisekedi, on the the 60th anniversary of Congo's independence on June 30, 1960.
The death of African American George Floyd last month as he was being arrested by police in the US city of Minneapolis has stoked fresh debate in Belgium over its colonial record.
I want to express my deepest regrets for these wounds of the past whose pain is reawakened today by the discrimination still present in our societies, Philippe said.
Historians say that millions of Africans from areas in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo were killed, mutilated or died of disease as they worked on rubber plantations belonging to Belgium's King Leopold II.
- 'Suffering and humiliation' -
Philippe, without mentioning Leopold by name, said that during this period acts of violence and cruelty were committed which weigh on our collective memory.
The colonial period which followed (1908-60) also caused suffering and humiliation, he said.
Philippe said he would combat all forms of racism and said he wanted to encourage the reflection on the issue begun by the Belgian parliament so that such memories could be put to rest.
Several statues of Leopold, who ruled between 1865 and 1909, have been daubed with paint or torn down by protesters in Belgium in recent weeks, and a petition has been launched for their removal.
On Tuesday, the city of Ghent will mark the 60th anniversary of Congolese independence by removing a statue of Leopold.
The French-speaking daily Le Soir welcomed the royal intervention in an editorial: Finally, this gesture, so necessary, which lifts the King and his country.
Through concession companies, Leopold II used forced labour to extract rubber in Congo, among other things.
Harsh treatment -- up to the cutting off of hands for unproductive workers -- have been documented.
According to most historians the violence did not stop after Leopold II, and a regime of strict separation of blacks and whites, comparable to the apartheid of South Africa, was maintained for decades.
We have heard of the famous 'benefits of civilisation' brought by the Belgians, Romain Landmeters, a researcher at the University Saint-Louis in Brussels, told AFP.
But between the roads, hospitals, schools, we know that everything that was built was essentially intended to serve this system of extraction and production of wealth for the settlers, he said.