Belgian court rules against state in a landmark case addressing its colonial past

A Brussels appeals court ruled on Monday that the Belgian state committed a crime against humanity in the case of five mixed-race women who were taken away from their Black mothers in infancy in a landmark case addressing the nation’s colonial past in Africa.

The five women fought a legal battle over some six years to make Belgium recognize responsibility for the suffering of thousands of mixed-race children. Known as “métis,” the…