Brussels Conference Act of 1890

Brussels Conference Act, 1890

Convention Relative to the Slave Trade and Importation into Africa of Firearms, Ammunition, and Spiritous Liquors
Type	Anti-slavery; drug control
Drafted	1889–1890
Signed	2 July 1890
Location	Brussels
Effective	31 August 1891
Negotiators	Austria-Hungary   Belgium   Congo Free State   Denmark   Ethiopia   France   Germany   Italy   Netherlands   Ottoman Empire Sublime State of Persia   Portugal   Russia   Spain   Zanzibar   Sweden–Norway   United Kingdom   United States

The Brussels Conference Act of 1890 (officially, the Convention Relative to the Slave Trade and Importation into Africa of Firearms, Ammunition, and Spiritous Liquors) ^[1] was a collection of anti-slavery measures signed in Brussels on 2 July 1890 (and which entered into force on 31 August 1891) to, as the act itself puts it, "put an end to Negro Slave Trade by land as well as by sea, and to improve the moral and material conditions of existence of the native races".

Context

The negotiations for this act arose out of the Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference 1889–90. ^[2] The act was specifically applicable to those countries "who have possessions or Protectorates in the conventional basin of the Congo", to the Ottoman Empire and other powers or parts who were involved in slave trade in East African coast, Indian Ocean and other areas.

The parties to the agreement were Austria-Hungarian Empire, Belgium, the Congo Free State, Denmark, Ethiopia, France, the German Empire, Italy, the Netherlands, the Ottoman Empire, Persia, Portugal, Russian Empire, Spain, Sultanate of Zanzibar, Sweden–Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States. ^{[3] [4] [5]}

The Brussels Act was supplemented and revised by the Convention of Saint-Germain-en-Laye 1919 signed by the Allied Powers of the First World War on 10 September 1919. ^[6]

Legal provisions

Trade in human beings

Article 21 of the Act describes the zone in which measures should be taken, referring to "the coasts of Indian Ocean (including the Persian Gulf and the Red Sea), the Belouchistan up to Tangalane (Quilimane)... " and Madagascar. The Act provided for the establishment of a relevant International Bureau in Zanzibar.

In its Article 68, the Act established the following:

"the Powers recognize the high value of the Law on the prohibition of Slave Trafficking of blacks, issued by His Majesty The Emperor of the Ottomans on 4–16 Dec. 1889, and are assured that a surveillance action will be taken by the Ottoman authorities, especially in the western part of Arabia and on the routes that keep that coast in communication with other possessions of His Imperial Majesty in Asia."

Similar actions were called on to be taken by the Shah of Persia and the Sultan of Zanzibar (Art. 69, 70). ^[7] The participants also agreed to stop sales of guns and other weapons to Africans. ^[8]

Drug control measures for liquor

Because of its provisions on alcohol, ^[9] the Act is considered the first treaties on the control of psychoactive substances (preceding the first opium treaty from 1909). ^[10]

See also

• 1926 Slavery Convention
• Supplementary Convention on the Abolition of Slavery
• Slave Trade Acts
• International drug control conventions

References

1. Bassiouni, M. Cherif (1987). A Draft International Criminal Code and Draft Statute for an International Criminal Tribunal (2nd ed.). Martinus Nijhoff Publishers. p. 405. ISBN   978-0-89838-918-0.
2. Brahm, Felix (2021). "Banning the sale of modern firearms in Africa: On the origins of the Brussels Conference Act of 1890" . Journal of Modern European History. 19 (4): 436–447. doi:10.1177/16118944211051218. ISSN   1611-8944. S2CID   245007531.
3. "Slave trade and importation into Africa of firearms, ammunition and spiritous liquor" (PDF). Library of Congress .
4. Miguel, Madueño; Alberto, Guerrero (2023-03-28). Examining Colonial Wars and Their Impact on Contemporary Military History. IGI Global. pp. 59–60. ISBN   978-1-6684-7042-8. Menelik had managed to become a part of the Brussels General Act of 1990 regulating the arms trade in Africa
5. Drysdale, John (1964). The Somali Dispute. F.A. Praeger. p. 62.
6. "United States of America – Convention revising the General Act of Berlin, February 26, 1885, and of the General Act and the Declaration of Brussels, July 2, 1890, signed at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, September 10, 1919 [1922] LNTSer 19; 8 LNTS 27". www.worldlii.org.
7. George Young. Corps de Droit Ottoman. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1905, pp. 192–206.
8. G. N. Uziogwe, ‘European Partition and Conquest of Africa: An Overview’, in A. A. Boahen (ed.), General History of Africa, vol. vii, (Oxford, 1990), p. 22
9. Pan, Lynn (1975). Alcool in Colonial Africa (PDF). Forssa: Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies.
10. Seddon, Toby (2016). "Inventing Drugs: A Genealogy of a Regulatory Concept". Journal of Law and Society. 43 (3): 393–415. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-6478.2016.00760.x . ISSN   1467-6478. S2CID   151655016.

External links

Original text:

• "Brussels Conference Act, 1890".
• General Act of the Brussels Conference relative to the African Slave Trade

See also:

• Jean Allain, "Fydor Martens and the Question of Slavery at the Brussels Conference".
• Slave trade and importation into Africa of firearms, ammunition and spiritous liquor