User:53e7fqo/sandbox

In 1441, the Portuguese captains captured 12 Africans and took them to Portugal as slaves. During the 1400s through the 1900s European colonists took advantage of Africa by taking blood diamonds as a resource to buy items, by creating the slave trade to develop economic and polotical growth, an by setting up new ways of transportation. Blood diamonds are a big part of history for Africa. Another word for blood diamonds is conflict diamonds. The name ‘blood diamonds’ was formulated during the 1990s. Angola, The Democratic Republic of Congo, and Sierra Leone directed world attention to the devastating role of diamonds. Rough diamonds mined in rebel-controlled areas were sold directly to merchants or smuggled into neighboring countries. Which were sold on the market. Conflict diamonds get cut & polished. After it enters a processing stream it looks identical to any other diamond. Blood diamonds were mined in war zones. In the 1990s, people boycotted to ban blood diamonds. After over a decade of boycotting, it got banned in 2002. In the U.S it is illegal to import or export conflict diamonds. Only 5%-10% of the diamonds are traded illegally in the present. In 1619, slavery began. Slaves got captured in war. People also became slaves in order to pay their debt/unpaid bills. Some jobs are farm labor, household servants, carrying goods, and salt mines. Salt mines were very dangerous and deadly to work in. There is no way one can survive a mine like that. Some slaves were treated like family, and others got beaten and got treated horribly. Slavery started around 700 CE. Slavery started to slowly end around the middle of the 1800s It continued in the 1900s and finally ended in the 1930s. Africa was split into 3 areas. Black, white, and mixed. The whites ruled over the black and whites. There were no black or mixed people in the government. In the 1600s, transportation started. People would use camels for transportation In the 16th century, the Portuguese transported upcountry to the coast of Mozambique. They used bullocks in South Africa. They used donkeys in Western Africa and Northern Africa. They used horses in Northern Nigeria. They used camels in Western Africa and Northern Africa. The first motor car came in the 1920s. Rail transportation was used to export materials from seaports to central consumptions. European colonists exploited Africa from the 1400s through the 1900s by using the continent's blood diamonds as a currency, starting the slave trade to spur the continent's economic and political development, and establishing new modes of transportation.