UK pauses plan to cede Chagos Islands amid US criticism
The British government has suspended an agreement to transfer sovereignty over the Chagos Islands, home to the US-British Diego Garcia air base, which was criticized by US President Donald Trump.
Planned legislation supporting a deal to hand over the islands to Mauritius, which needs Washington’s support, will not be included in the government’s next parliamentary agenda, The Times newspaper said on Saturday.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s office said London would try to persuade Washington to give formal approval.
Trump said in February that the deal was a “big mistake”, having previously said it was the best deal Starmer could have gotten.
According to the agreement, Britain will retain control of the strategically important military base in Diego Garcia with a 99-year lease, and US operations there will continue.
A British government spokesman said ensuring the long-term operational security of Diego Garcia would remain a priority.
“We continue to believe that the agreement is the best way to protect the long-term future of the base, but we have always said that we would only proceed with the agreement if there was US support,” the spokesman said.
“We continue relations with the USA and Mauritius.”
Britain forcibly displaced some 2,000 indigenous Chagossians in the late 1960s and 1970s to establish a base on the Diego Garcia atoll.
Toby Noskwith, a spokesman for the indigenous Chagossian People campaign group, said there had been some hesitancy about the deal from the beginning among senior figures in the Trump administration, perhaps even the president himself.
“We were surprised we got to this point,” Noskwith said.
“This has been framed primarily as an interstate issue, but the people lost throughout the process are Chagossians, particularly the elderly and survivors.”
He said questions needed to be asked about “the enormous amount of money wasted on a collapsed negotiation and the legality of devising a plan that denies the Chagossians their right to self-determination.”
He said Starmer should facilitate the dignified resettlement of Chagossian people.
The alliance between Washington and London has been strained in recent weeks over Starmer’s reluctance to join the US-Israeli war against Iran and his refusal at the start of the conflict to allow Trump to use British air bases to launch attacks.
Since then, US forces have been allowed to carry out what the prime minister calls defensive strikes.
Trump also repeatedly criticized the British leader, saying he was “no Winston Churchill” and was ruining what is often called the “special relationship” between Britain and the United States.
