2004: Slavery Abolition Year
International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery and its Abolition 

The proclamation by the United Nations General Assembly of the year 2004 as International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery and its Abolition marks, on the one hand, the bicentenary of the proclamation of the first black state, Haiti, symbol of the struggle and resistance of slaves, and triumph of the principles of liberty, equality, dignity and the rights of the individual, and, on the other, the fraternal reunion of the peoples of Africa, the Americas, the Caribbean and Europe...