Ahead of King Charles III's visit to Guyana, Britain is being urged to apologise for slavery and support a reparations framework offering debt relief and cheaper financing to affected countries.

President Dr Irfaan Ali told ITV News that the transatlantic slave trade caused deep and lasting damage that cannot be addressed through financial compensation alone. The King is due in Guyana on October 29 and 30.

"You cannot ever value the type of injustice that took place. You can never, you know, create a monetary mechanism to address that," Ali said.
Instead, he proposed building the historical impact of slavery into the terms of development financing.

"What you can do is to identify the development gaps, the development inequality, the underdevelopment that took place as a result of slavery, as a result of that dark history," he said.
Under such a model, affected countries would receive more concessional loans, debt relief and additional financing for climate change adaptation, education, healthcare and mental health services.

He said reparations are not about a payout.
"This is no payback time. And this is not vendetta. It is not payback. It is not charity. It is none of those things," he said.

"This is about sitting down in a mature way and finding a solution that not only understands the pain and the darkness of those days, but put a value on what that darkness was and come up with a development model that addresses this."
Asked whether King Charles should formally apologise, Ali said the monarch's acknowledgement of slavery as one of the darkest periods in British history was an important step, but not the end of the process.

"The King has already expressed regret," he said.
However, he agreed an apology would help.
"I agree with you that that an apology would go a long way in creating this environment of having a free-flowing discussions," he said.

Ali added that reparations must be addressed collectively through the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), the African Union and the Commonwealth, and not as an issue for Guyana alone. He hoped Commonwealth leaders would agree a course of action.

He also criticised those in British political circles who argue there is nothing to regret or be ashamed of in the country's history."Something is seriously wrong within that mentality of anyone who believed that," he said.
He rejected comparisons between slavery and other historical conflicts or territorial conquests, saying the forced enslavement of human beings was a distinct injustice.

Ali noted the generational trauma across the Caribbean, including among African descendants, Indigenous peoples and descendants of indentured labourers, among them his own ancestors from India.
Despite this history, he said King Charles would be warmly welcomed, citing the monarch's longstanding relationship with Guyana and his work promoting tropical forest conservation and climate action. Ali also highlighted the strong ties between Guyana and the United Kingdom, including British-backed financing for major development projects.

Even so, he said: "The King coming to Guyana cannot— the question of apology cannot be avoided, because this is the region in which the heart, the pain of slavery was most felt."
Ali said younger generations in Britain would help advance the discussions, and that Guyana would continue to champion reparations as part of a regional effort.