In a landmark case, a court ruled that the women, now in their 70s and 80s, who were taken from their parents in Belgian Congo, were victims of a crime against humanity.

A Belgium court has ordered the government to pay reparations to five mixed-race women who were forcibly removed from their families in the colonial-era Belgian Congo. The women, now in their 70s, were taken from their mothers when they were young children and placed in orphanages under a state policy.

In a landmark ruling, a Belgian court has found the state guilty of crimes against humanity for the forced removal of mixed-race children from their mothers during Belgium’s colonial rule in the Congo.