To be clear, although it was already known by fishermen, this archipelago was not occupied by locals and was first settled by the European countries that deemed

To be clear, although it was already known by fishermen, this archipelago was not occupied by locals and was first settled by the European countries that deemed it a worthy endeavour (although mostly using slaves of course). European colonisation isn't rosy, but there is a lot of misinformation out there and things happened widely differently in different places. It's really far from being a simple "subjugate the locals and appropriate their lands" story everywhere.