‘File 5/6 I Brussels Conference and general rules and procedure on slave traffic’ [‎32v] (81/297)

to civilization and bring about the extinction of
larbarous customs, such as cannibalism and human
sacrifices.
2. To give aid and protection to commercial
undertakings; to watch over their legality by
controlling especially contracts of service with
natives, and to lead up to the foundation of per
manent centres of cultivation and of commercial
establishments.
3. To protect, without distinction of creed, the
Missions which are already or are about to be
established.
4. To provide for the sanitary service, and to
grant hospitality and help to explorers and to all
who take part in Africa in the work of repressing
the Slave Trade.
ARTICLE III.
The Powers exercising a sovereignty or a protec
torate in Africa confirm and give precision to their
former declarations, and undertake to proceed
gradually, as circumstances permit, either by the
means above indicated, or by any other means
which they may consider suitable, with the repres
sion of the Slave Trade, each State in its respective
possessions and under its own direction. When
ever they consider it possible, they will lend their
good offices to the Powers which, with a purelv
humanitarian object, may be engaged in Africa
upon a similiar mission,
ARTICLE IV.
The States exercising sovereign powers or pro
tectorates in Africa may in all cases delegate to
Companies provided with Charters all or a portion
of the engagements which they assume in virtue
of Article III. They remain, nevertheless, directly
responsible for the engagements which they con
tract by the present Act, and guarantee the execu
tion thereof. The Powers promise to receive, aid,
and protect the national Associations and enter
prises due to private initiative which may wish to
co-operate in their possessions in the repression of
the Slave Trade, subject to their receiving previous
authorization, such authorization being revocable
at any time, subject also to their being directed
and controlled, and to the exclusion of the exercise
of rights of sovereignty.
ARTICLE V.
The Contracting Powers undertake, unless this
has already been provided for by their laws in
accordance with the spirit of the present Article,
to enact or propose to their respective Legislatures
in the course of one year at latest from the date of
the signature of the present General Act a Law
for rendering applicable, on the one hand, the
provisions of their penal laws concerning the graver
offences against the person, to the organizers and
abettors of slave-hunting, to perpetrators of the
mutilation of adulls and male infants, and to all
persons who may take part in the capture of slaves
by violence; and, on the other hand, the provisions
relating to offences against individual liberty, to
carriers, transporters, and dealers in slaves.
The associates and accessories of the different
categories of slave captors and dealers above speci
fied shall be punished with penalties proportionate
to those incurred by the principals.
Guilty persons who may have escaped from
jurisdiction of the authorities of the country^, Admimstr
the crimes or offences have been committed si fi re " arms 1
be arrested either on communication of the in fr om Sl i l< '' 1
minatory evidence by the authorities who fo ^ on ^ ^
ascertained the violation of the law, or on prod .
tion of any other proof of guilt by the Power re ^ use ^
whose territory they may have been discoverd j suc ^, aS 1
shall be kept without other formality at the disa W j e
of the Tribunals competent to try them. ridges, c:
them.
The Powers will communicate to each ot
within the shortest possible delay the Laws Vp
Decrees existing or promulgated in execution nc< '
the present Article. may pern
powder ai
ARTICLE VI. of improv
Slaves liberated in consequence of the stopp
or dispersal of a convoy in the interior of the «
tinent shall be sent back, if circumstances pen
to their country of origin; if not, the local autk
ties shall facilitate as much as possible th^ir me;
of living, and, if they desire it, help them to set
on the spot.
ARTICLE VII.
Any fugitive slave claiming on the continent:
protection of a Signatory Power shall obtain:
and shall be received in the camps and static
officially established by such Power, or on k
the vessels of such Power plying on the lakes j
rivers. Private stations and boats are only pern
ted to exercise the right of asylum subject to t
previous sanction of such Power.
• ARTICLE VIII.
The experience of all nations who have int
course with Africa having shown the pernicious a;
preponderating' part played by fire-arm s in SL
Trade operations as well as in inlcrnal vvar betw
the native tribes; and this same experience havi:
clearly proved that the preservation of the Afria
populations whose existence it is the express «
of the Powers to safeguard is a radical impos
bilitv if restrictive measures against the trade
lire-arms and ammunition are not established, t
Powers decide, in so far as the present state
their frontiers permits, that the importation offc
arms, and especially of rifles and improved we»p«
as well as of powder, balls, and cartridges,:
except in the cases and under the conditions p:
vided for in the following Article, prohibited ii)!
territories comprised between the ^Oth parallel
north latitude and the 22 nd parallel of son
latitude, and extending westward to the Atlfflt
Ocean and eastward to the Indian Ocean, and
dependencies, comprising the islands adjacent j
the coast as far as 1UU nautical miles frnm'
shore.
ARTICLE IX.
The introduction of fire-arms and ammuniti
when there shall be occasion to authorize it in"
possessions of the Signatory Powers which exert
rights of sovereignty or of protectorate in Afe
shall be regulated, unless identical or morerigon
Regulations have been already applied, in f*
following manner in the zon e laid down in Arti
All imported fire-arms shall be deposited, at ;
cost, risk, and peril of the importers, in a
warehouse placed under the supervision of ^
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