Caribbean leaders have stepped up their campaign for reparations for slavery and colonial rule by asking Britain to give up its overseas territories, including the Cayman Islands. The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) delegation representing 15 countries took their message to London and raised what they describe as “extractive colonialism” with British MPs.

The grouping also named other territories in the region, including Turks and Caicos, Anguilla, Montserrat, the British Virgin Islands and Bermuda.

CARICOM said former colonial powers should provide financial compensation and relinquish control of territories that remain under European rule. The delegation said their aim is to address the lingering effects of slavery, colonial rule and the constitutional arrangements that still shape life in those places.

A wider reparations plan

The new position is set out in a CARICOM working document that expands a 10-point reparations manifesto first produced in 2014. That earlier plan, which was rebuffed by successive UK governments, called for measures ranging from a formal apology to debt cancellation. The updated version adds the question of overseas territories to what CARICOM describes as a broader call for reparative justice.

According to CARICOM, the issue goes beyond compensation for slavery alone. The expanded proposals also seek redress for the later use of indentured labour after abolition, climate change, and the effects of slavery on women, who are described as having been sexually exploited and denied families. CARICOM argues that these harms were part of the same historical system and still impact the region today.

CARICOM’s working paper argues that decolonisation should form part of reparations for British Overseas Territories, saying colonial constitutional arrangements continue to limit economic and political autonomy in the territories.

It adds that other territories such as Saint Martin, Aruba, Curaçao, Martinique and Guadeloupe have a “legitimate claim to nationhood and freedom” that has been suppressed by “colonisers”. The commission said decolonisation would help end the condition of residents living as “second-class inhabitants” in territories that remained under European control.

Pressure in London

The group’s presentation in the UK Parliament, before the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Afrikan Reparations (APPG-AR), underlines how far the campaign has moved beyond a symbolic appeal. CARICOM is testing whether British lawmakers are prepared to engage with demands that now include decolonisation, not just compensation.

Sir Hilary Beckles, who chairs the CARICOM Reparations Commission, said the Caribbean remains the most colonised part of the world.

He said: “We are still here, from being the first part of the world to be colonised. The world has been maybe 90% decolonised. But the Caribbean remains the most colonised part of the world, and this has to stop.”

He added that King Charles should support decolonisation to “break the chains of imperial governance” and said, “We cannot abide the fact that maybe 20% of the population in the Caribbean are still living in colonies.”

His comments underline how CARICOM frames the issue not as a narrow territorial dispute, but as part of a larger argument about political autonomy and economic self-determination.

Church and future talks

The delegation also met senior clergy from the Church of England as part of their wider lobbying effort in London.

CARICOM members said the framework for negotiations over the new demands would be worked out first between leaders in the Caribbean and Africa before European governments are approached. That sequencing suggests a deliberate effort to build a common front before entering talks with former colonial powers, including Britain.

For the Cayman Islands, the demand is not distant or symbolic. Cayman is directly named in the debate over Britain’s Overseas Territories, and linked to the regional argument about sovereignty, history and responsibility. The next step will be for Caribbean governments to set out how far they intend to press the proposal, what negotiations should follow, and whether Britain has any formal response to the new demand.