Namibia Remembers a Dark Chapter in Its Colonial Past

Published on: 29 May, 2025

Skulls of people from the Ovaherero and Nama tribes, which were taken by German colonial forces more than a century ago for racial experiments, are returned to Namibian tribal leaders during a ceremony on Sept. 29, 2011, in Berlin, Germany. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn, File)

Namibia has honoured the victims of mass killings carried out under German colonial rule, with an inaugural memorial day held on Wednesday.

Between 1904 and 1908, German forces killed more than 70,000 people and imprisoned thousands in concentration camps. Historians, along with the United Nations, have long recognised the atrocities as the first genocide of the 20th century.

Communities descended from those targeted during the genocide, including the Herero and Nama peoples, are now calling for the return of ancestral lands currently held by members of Namibia’s German-speaking minority.

Al Jazeera.