These European Leaders Agree With Donald Trump That Statues Must Not Be Removed

Anti-racism protests that began in the U.S. have since spread across Western Europe as demonstrators call for action to address systemic racism and historical oppression of black and minority communities by white imperialist societies.

The unrest began with the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis, but the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has given European anti-racism movements fresh momentum, re-energizing anger at the continent's long history of racism and colonialism, plus deep current inequalities in wealth, opportunity and standards of living for many minority communities.

Public statues depicting those involved in such oppression and exploitation—for example slave traders, colonists and military figures—have become lightning rods for protesters' anger.

Many of these statues have long been sources of controversy and requests for removal, but the wave of anger unleashed by Floyd's death has forced authorities to consider whether they should remain or be taken down.

European leaders have expressed sympathy for the demands of the protesters, though condemned reports of demonstrators resorting to violence against police, property, or offensive statues. Several leaders and prominent public figures have rejected calls for statues of historical figures to be removed, claiming it would be tantamount to erasing history.

But activists say that leaving these statues up constitutes an assault on minority communities and a refusal of the white-dominated European political sphere to acknowledge crimes committed by such figures.

The U.K. has one of the longest and darkest histories of European nations, its empire covering some 24 percent of the world's land area and 23 percent of its population at its peak. Britain was also instrumental in the transatlantic slave trade, extracting enormous wealth and resources that funded its imperial project and industrialization.

The statue debate resurfaced in the U.K. last week when protesters in the western port city of Bristol—a prominent slave trading center that grew rich off the industry—tore down a statue of slaver Edward Colston, which they then threw into the city's harbor. Activists had long petitioned the city to remove the statue without success.

The city's Mayor Marvin Rees said that as a political leader he could not condone the damage, but that the statue was "an affront to me. Not just as a Jamaican heritage man but as a human being." Its removal, he said, was a "piece of historical poetry."

Prime Minister Boris Johnson—who has regularly been accused of using racist rhetoric and consistently refused to apologize for doing so—does not share Rees' outlook.

He tweeted: "We cannot now try to edit or censor our past. We cannot pretend to have a different history...To tear them down would be to lie about our history, and impoverish the education of generations to come."

Bristol authorities have recovered the statue of Colston and intend to put it in a museum. Many advocates of statue removal say this is the best way to remove offensive installations without erasing important historical lessons.

But statues are fast becoming a proxy issue in the country's bubbling left-right culture war. On Saturday, London's Parliament Square was thronged with violent far-right demonstrators—including avowed neo-Nazi, white supremacist and fascist groups—marching against BLM and claiming the need to defend nearby statues.

Ironically, some were pictured performing Nazi salutes at police near the statue of former prime minister and British wartime hero Winston Churchill, which along with other sensitive sites had already been boxed up by authorities to prevent vandalism.

French President Emmanuel Macron also framed the debate as one between maintaining and destroying history. In a Sunday address, Macron said his government "will not erase any trace, or any name, from its history ... it will not take down any statue."

More than 15,000 people attended a march in Paris, France, on Saturday in the latest action, according to France 24. Though stimulated by the Floyd unrest in the U.S., this is the latest round of unrest in France over police treatment of French ethnic minorities and systemic racism.

Macron called on French people to unite against racism and inequality, and added, "We should look at all of our history together"—including France's colonization of Africa and brutal conflicts during decolonization—to find "truth" instead of "denying who we are."

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also refused to take down statues honoring the Netherlands' controversial historical figures, many of whom were involved in the country's colonization and exploitation of parts of South America, Africa, India and southeast Asia.

Last week, Rutte told a press conference: "You cannot say: I will erase a statue. I'll throw it in Lake IJssel [an inland bay in the Netherlands] and then that history no longer exists. So recognize that that history is there, see the pluses and minuses, and talk about it."

Across the border in Belgium, marchers targeted statues of King Leopold II, who oversaw the country's brutalization of Congo in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As many as 10 million people are thought to have died under Leopold's rule.

There are at least 13 statues of Leopold around the country, according to the BBC, and the clamor for their removal is growing. The University of Mons has already removed a Leopold statue following a student-led petition, and said in a statement that the effigy represented the "rape, mutilation and genocide of millions of Congolese."

The most prominent Leopold statue sits outside the royal palace in Brussels. At the time of writing, almost 78,000 people have signed a petition calling on the city to remove all statues of the former ruler.

But last week, the younger brother of Belgium's King Philippe, Prince Laurent, dismissed the movement against his ancestor and said Leopold was not responsible for colonial crimes. "He never went to Congo himself, so I don't see how he could have made people suffer there," Laurent said.

The statue debate reached Milan, Italy last week when an installation commemorating a controversial journalist was vandalized with red paint. Indro Montanelli defended colonization and admitted to buying and marrying a 12-year-old Eritrean girl while serving in the Italian army in the 1930s. He died in 2001.

Activist group Rete Studenti Milano said Montanelli was "a colonialist who made slavery an important part of his political activity" and said he "cannot and should not be celebrated in the public square."

But Milan Mayor Giuseppe Sala said Montanelli was "a great journalist who fought for the freedom of the press." He added, "When we judge our own lives, can we say that ours is spotless? Lives must be judged in their complexity."