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Concept
Treaty of London (1839)
Summary
The Treaty of London of 1839, was signed on 19 April 1839 between the Concert of Europe, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Kingdom of Belgium. It was a direct follow-up to the 1831 Treaty of the XVIII Articles, which the Netherlands had refused to sign, and the result of negotiations at the London Conference of 1838–1839.
Under the treaty, the European powers recognised and guaranteed the independence and neutrality of Belgium and established the full independence of the German-speaking part of Luxembourg. Article VII required Belgium to remain perpetually neutral; Belgium formally abandoned its policy of neutrality after its experiences in both world wars.
Belgian Revolution
Since 1815, Belgium had been a reluctant part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. In 1830, Belgians broke away and established an independent Kingdom of Belgium. The overwhelmingly Catholic population could not accept the Dutch king's favouritism toward Protestantism, while French-speakers were irritated by his disdain for the French language, and the middle classes objected to the Dutch monopolisation of public offices. Liberals regarded King William I's rule as despotic, while there were high levels of unemployment and industrial unrest among the working classes.
Small-scale fighting – the death of some 600 volunteers is commemorated in the Place des Martyrs, Brussels – was followed by an international settlement in 1831. However the settlement was not accepted by the Dutch, who invaded the country in the autumn of 1831; and it took a French army recapturing Antwerp in 1832 before Belgium and the Netherlands could even agree an armistice. Several years later, the Netherlands recognised that they stood to gain more territory by accepting the 1831 settlement than from a mere continuance of the armistice. The Belgian government protested, with French support, against the late implementation of the settlement terms, but Britain accepted the Dutch claim; and in 1839, the Dutch accepted Belgian independence (and regained the disputed territories) by the Treaty of London.
Official source
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