Slave Trade Archives on
Agenda of UNESCO Meeting in Cuba
UNESCO,
November 3, 2004. ONU, NY.
Archivists from 11 countries will meet
this month in Cuba to discuss new perspectives
for the consolidation and extension of UNESCO's
Slave Trade Archives Project, an initiative
to safeguard the documents related to slave
trade and slavery within the framework UNESCO's
Memory of the World Programme.
The meeting, that is jointly organized
by UNESCO and the National Archives of Cuba
from 22 to 24 November 2004 in La Havana,
aims to harmonize the strategies of each
country in order to create a synergy of
the Slave Trade Archives Project. "We
hope that we are able to improve national
participation in the projects and its geographical
coverage" says project manager Abdelaziz
Abid. A comprehensive project evaluation
study will be conducted in parallel with
the meeting.
The meeting will gather representatives
from the national archives of the participating
countries. Participants will each present
a progress report of their respective national
slave trade archives programmes. The countries
include Benin, Cape Verde, Gambia, Ghana
and Senegal in Africa, as well as Argentina,
Barbados, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba and Haiti
in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Marking 2004 as the International Year
to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery
and its Abolition this meeting provides
an opportunity to renew the Organization's
commitment to make universally known the
transatlantic slave trade and slavery, its
causes and dramatic results, by means of
scientific work.
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