Found this interesting given the citation of a naive African writer....and a previous conversation about minorities having their own voice from this past Friday...
(and understanding that Africans are not really the "minority" in this instance)
"Slavery was practiced in some parts of Africa,[16] Europe,[16] Asia[16] and the Americas before the beginning of the Atlantic slave trade. There is evidence that enslaved people from some African states were exported to other states in Africa, Europe and Asia prior to the European colonization of the Americas.[17] The African slave trade provided a large number of slaves to Europeans.[18][19]
The Atlantic slave trade was not the only slave trade from Africa, although it was the largest in volume and intensity. As Elikia M’bokolo wrote in Le Monde diplomatique: "The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth).... Four million enslaved people exported via the Red Sea, another four million[20] through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean."[21]
According to John K. Thornton, Europeans usually bought enslaved people who were captured in endemic warfare between African states.[22] There were also Africans who had made a business out of capturing Africans from neighboring ethnic groups or war captives and selling them.[23] People living around the Niger River were transported from these markets to the coast and sold at European trading ports in exchange for muskets (matchlock between 1540–1606 but flintlock from then on) and manufactured goods such as cloth or alcohol.[24] However, the European demand for slaves provided a large new market for the already existing trade.[25] Further, while those held in slavery in their own region of Africa might hope to escape, those shipped away had little chance of returning to Africa."
via, wikipedia
(and understanding that Africans are not really the "minority" in this instance)
"Slavery was practiced in some parts of Africa,[16] Europe,[16] Asia[16] and the Americas before the beginning of the Atlantic slave trade. There is evidence that enslaved people from some African states were exported to other states in Africa, Europe and Asia prior to the European colonization of the Americas.[17] The African slave trade provided a large number of slaves to Europeans.[18][19]
The Atlantic slave trade was not the only slave trade from Africa, although it was the largest in volume and intensity. As Elikia M’bokolo wrote in Le Monde diplomatique: "The African continent was bled of its human resources via all possible routes. Across the Sahara, through the Red Sea, from the Indian Ocean ports and across the Atlantic. At least ten centuries of slavery for the benefit of the Muslim countries (from the ninth to the nineteenth).... Four million enslaved people exported via the Red Sea, another four million[20] through the Swahili ports of the Indian Ocean, perhaps as many as nine million along the trans-Saharan caravan route, and eleven to twenty million (depending on the author) across the Atlantic Ocean."[21]
According to John K. Thornton, Europeans usually bought enslaved people who were captured in endemic warfare between African states.[22] There were also Africans who had made a business out of capturing Africans from neighboring ethnic groups or war captives and selling them.[23] People living around the Niger River were transported from these markets to the coast and sold at European trading ports in exchange for muskets (matchlock between 1540–1606 but flintlock from then on) and manufactured goods such as cloth or alcohol.[24] However, the European demand for slaves provided a large new market for the already existing trade.[25] Further, while those held in slavery in their own region of Africa might hope to escape, those shipped away had little chance of returning to Africa."
via, wikipedia
