Colonisers speak - 60 years after Congo's independence

André de Maere loves telling stories about his travels through the rainforests of Congo, where as a colonial ruler in the 1950s he settled disputes in local tribes and executed Belgian law.

He's far less likely though to talk about how Belgium pillaged the wealth of a nation for almost eight decades and was responsible for, what some historians call, one of the largest genocides in human history.

"They were the best years of my life," de Maere, who is 90, said of his colonial care...