The ceremony came only days after a historic visit to DR Congo by King Philippe of Belgium, which was billed as a chance to build new ties after atrocities committed during the colonial rule. The Belgian Congo remained a colony until DR Congo gained its independence in 1960.■...
Having never set foot in the Congo, he drew vast profits from the territory by means of initiating a series of appalling atrocities as his employees coerced Africans into harvesting rubber in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Such emphasis on exploitation fits with a long-standing...
which comes from trees, this type of rubber cannot be cultivated. The intense drive to collect latex from wild plants was responsible for many of the atrocities committed under the Congo Free State.
The Congo Reform Association was formed to spread the news about Belgian atrocities in Congo, and gained the support of prominent people such as Mark Twain and Arthur Conan Doyle. Notably the Catholic Church has a history of acknowledging and apologizing for acts in which it was involved ...
Belgian Congo (Congo Belge) was a colony in Africa that was ruled by Belgium from 1908 until June 30, 1960, when it became an independent republic; it is now known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Read here to learn more about the Belgian Congo.