Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference 1889–90
[3] Leopold was able to seize the region by convincing other European states at the Berlin Conference on Africa that he was involved in humanitarian and philanthropic work and would not tax trade.
Leopold also feared that Lavigerie, who in his previous speeches had accused Tippu Tip of slave trading, might harm the Arab policy of his Congo Free State.
In his Brussels speech, although Lavigerie pointed sharply to the rampant slave trade in Congo Free State, he attributed this to a lack of resources.
[1][8] The Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference also indirectly adied the long ongoing British campaign against slave trade and slavery in the Ottoman Empire.
In anticipation of the Brussels Anti-Slavery Conference, which was due to take place in November 1889, the British diplomatic campaign on the Porte had a breakthrough.
[9] The British diplomatic pressure finally gave results when Sultan Abdul Hamid II introduced the Kanunname of 1889 on 30 December 1889, the first law code (in contrast to previous nominal decrees) that formally banned slave trade in the Ottoman Empire.
[14] The General Act of the Brussels Conference stipulated that the organisation of legal, religious and military services in African colonies and protectorates was the best means of combating the slave trade.
The arms trade not only strengthened the power of the Arab-Swahilis, but guns and ammunition were also the usual means of exchange to obtain slaves and vice versa.
Influenced by the conference, the Ottoman Empire passed a new law that banned the import, transit and export of slaves, but left the institution of slavery untouched.
[1] In a prior correspondence with England, Leopold had requested that all countries that had to incur expenses in the fight against the slave trade be allowed to levy a moderate import duty; there was no objection to this.
He requested the abolition of Article 4 of the Berlin Act and asked that the countries of the conventional Congo basin be allowed to levy an import duty of up to 10 per cent ad valorem, a ban or tax on alcohol was also considered, as it was closely linked to the slave trade.
[1][16] Briefly, the conference led to the negotiation of the first treaty abolishing the Indian Ocean slave trade, the Brussels Convention, which was adopted in 1890 and entered into force on 2 April 1892.
