São Tomé and Príncipe

   Comprising a former colony of Portugal, these two islands of volcanic origin are located in the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa. The Portuguese first found these tropical islands about 1471, and efforts to settle them began in 1486 on São Tomé and about 1500 on Príncipe Island. Portugal settled them with

   African slaves from the mainland. A significant portion of the Africans who were forced to work the coffee and cocoa plantations were from Angola, and some were from the Cape Verde Islands. The early economy of the islands was dominated by sugar as plantations were established, based on the systems pioneered earlier in Madeira and the Cape Verdes. In the 19th and 20th centuries, however, coffee and cocoa plantations were developed. The cocoa plantations, which were owned largely by Portuguese from Portugal, produced the raw material for chocolate and soon formed the principal wealth of this colony.

   In the early 20th century, forced labor practices and other labor abuses on the Portuguese-owned plantations drew worldwide attention through the famous writings of the British investigative reporter-writer, Henry W. Nevinson. Portugal's colonial rule there, as well as in Angola and Mozambique, whose excesses were now exposed in newspapers and books, also came under the scrutiny of leading humanitarian organizations in London and elsewhere. Although Portugal defended colonial rule in this case and made reform efforts, tragically extensive labor abuse in the islands persisted into the middle of the 20th century. The islands were not involved in a war of African insurgency. In 1975, Portugal granted independence to the archipelago, whose official language of government and instruction remains Portuguese.