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King Leopold II, whose rule of the Congo Free State was marked by severe atrocities, violence and major population decline.. Even before his accession to the throne of Belgium in 1865, the future king Leopold II began lobbying leading Belgian politicians to create a colonial empire in the Far East or in Africa, which would expand and enhance Belgian prestige. [2]
Leopold II [a] (9 April 1835 – 17 December 1909) was the second King of the Belgians from 1865 to 1909, and the founder and sole owner of the Congo Free State from 1885 to 1908. Born in Brussels as the second but eldest-surviving son of King Leopold I and Queen Louise , Leopold succeeded his father to the Belgian throne in 1865 and reigned ...
Leopold II offered to reform his Congo Free State regime, but international opinion supported an end to the king's rule, and no nation was willing to accept this responsibility. Belgium was the obvious European candidate to annex the Congo Free State. For two years, it debated the question and held new elections on the issue.
The brother of Belgium's king joined a swelling debate about its past on Friday by saying that King Leopold II, under whose rule millions of Congolese were killed or maimed, could not have "made ...
After an interview with Leopold, Williams went to the Congo to see "Christian civilization" in action. In early April 1891 Williams wrote a letter to Leopold entitled An Open Letter to His Serene Majesty Leopold II, King of the Belgians and Sovereign of the Independent State of Congo about the suffering of the region at the hands of Leopold's ...
In 1904 Leopold II was forced to allow an international parliamentary commission of inquiry entry to the Congo Free State. By 1908, public pressure and diplomatic manoeuvres led to the end of Leopold II's personal rule and to the annexation of the Congo as a colony of Belgium, known as the "Belgian Congo".
The book was intended as an exposé of the situation in the so-called Congo Free State (labelled a "rubber regime" by Conan Doyle), an area occupied and designated as the personal property of Leopold II of Belgium and where the serious human rights abuses were occurring. Indigenous people in the region were being brutally exploited and tortured ...
Belgium had a particular moral duty to act because looting of Congo's resources began during the 19th century colonial rule of its King Leopold II, said Congo's Belgian lawyer Christophe Marchand.