The Government of Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer agreed Thursday to hand over sovereignty over the British Indian Ocean Territory Chagos Islands to Mauritius after two years of talks to bring to an end a dispute lasting some six decades. As per the new understanding, the UK and the United States get to keep using the military base in Diego García Island, British Foreign Secretary David Lammy explained.
By Daniel Kawczynski, MP for Shrewsbury & Atcham since 2005 - Before I start to talk about this British Overseas Territory, I would like to say that I returned last week from another British Overseas Territory—the Falkland Islands—with my hon. Friend James Sunderland and Stephen Doughty, who is the shadow Minister for the Overseas Territories.
Argentina's Foreign minister Hector Timerman will receive on Tuesday Olivier Bancoult, president of the Chagos Refugees Group, the entity which represents the 'Chagossians' forcibly ousted from their lands by the United Kingdom. The administration of President Cristina Fernandez pretends to expose contradictions in the UK's approach to the Chagos case and the Falklands sovereignty dispute.
The British government announced to Parliament that it will commission a new feasibility study into the resettlement of the British Indian Ocean Territory, BIOT, whose indigenous population the Chagossian was removed in the sixties and early seventies for defense reasons and is an issue that remains highly controversial and sensitive.