![]() Leopold II, King of the Belgians and de facto owner of the Congo Free State from 1885 to 1908 Stanley's exploration In addition, a number of major Belgian investment companies pushed the Belgian government to take over the Congo and develop the mining sector as it was virtually untapped. It became known thereafter as the Belgian Congo. By 1908, public pressure and diplomatic manoeuvres led to the end of Leopold II's absolutist rule and to the Belgian Parliament enacting an act to annex the Congo Free State as a colony of Belgium. Also active in exposing the activities of the Congo Free State was the author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose book The Crime of the Congo was widely read in the early 1900s. During the Congo Free State propaganda war, European and US reformers exposed atrocities in the Congo Free State to the public through the Congo Reform Association, founded by Roger Casement and the journalist, author, and politician E. The lack of accurate records makes it difficult to quantify the number of deaths caused by the exploitation and the lack of immunity to new diseases introduced by contact with European colonists. The boldest estimates state that the forced labour system led directly and indirectly to the deaths of 50 percent of the population. Debate has been ongoing about the high death rate in this period. The loss of life and atrocities inspired literature such as Joseph Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness and raised an international outcry. The Casement Report of the British Consul Roger Casement led to the arrest and punishment of officials who had been responsible for killings during a rubber-collecting expedition in 1903. Under Leopold II's administration, the Congo Free State became one of the greatest international scandals of the early 20th century. Leopold II's Free State extracted ivory, rubber and minerals in the upper Congo basin for sale on the world market through a series of international concessionary companies, even though its ostensible purpose in the region was to uplift the local people and develop the area. Leopold's reign in the Congo eventually earned infamy on account of the atrocities perpetrated on the locals. The state included the entire area of the present Democratic Republic of the Congo and existed from 1885 to 1908, when the government of Belgium reluctantly annexed the state after international pressure. The Congo Free State operated as a separate nation from Belgium, in a personal union with its King, privately controlled by Leopold II, although he never personally visited the state. On, after the closure of the Berlin Conference, the king announced that he planned to name his possessions "the Congo Free State", an appellation which was not yet used at the Berlin Conference and which officially replaced "International Association of the Congo" on 1 August 1885. ![]() Via the International Association of the Congo, he was able to lay claim to most of the Congo Basin. ![]() Leopold was able to seize the region by convincing other European states at the Berlin Conference on Africa that he was involved in humanitarian and philanthropic work and would not tax trade. It was privately owned by and in a personal union with Leopold II of Belgium it was not a part of, nor did it belong to, the Kingdom of Belgium, of which he was the constitutional monarch. The Congo Free State, also known as the Independent State of the Congo ( French: État indépendant du Congo), was a large state and absolute monarchy in Central Africa from 1885 to 1908.
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