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News [1]

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Date: 2025-06

LALIT on the UK-Mauritius Agreement on Chagos including Diego Garcia

26.05.2025

The signature last week, on 22 May 2025, of the UK-MAURITIUS “Agreement” on Chagos including Diego Garcia by the respective governments of Keir Starmer and Navin Ramgoolam is both the end of the UK’s claim to owning Chagos including Diego Garcia and the end of its total banishment of the Chagossian people from their homes, and also the beginning of a new form of UK-USA colonial control over Mauritius and Chagos, including Diego Garcia, and a new form of social control over Chagossians, which is less rigorous than outright banishment.

Here are some thoughts from LALIT, after our initial discussions on the Agreement, including its Annexes, which are essential to understanding the Agreement. We have also read the British Government’s “Explanatory Memorandum” which adds insights into how the imperialists see the “deal”, and into how much of a corner they had got themselves into, because of the constant struggles over 50 years against their continued colonization, banishment, and military occupation of Chagos.

So, the Agreement represents a victory for what only LALIT for so long believed, i.e. that Mauritius is sovereign and would be proven one day to be sovereign. The Republic of Mauritius can now be unified, potentially. It represents a victory that the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) is now to be dismantled, having been the name of an illegal occupation for 57 years, all along. However, at the same time, the Agreement is also a defeat in terms of the drastic limits on Mauritius’ exercise of sovereignty outlined in the Annexes to the Agreement, which are part and parcel of the Agreement. Mauritians, including Chagossians, are still a long way from democratic control over this part of the territory of the Republic, despite the Constitution saying we ought to be living in a “sovereign democratic state”. Not yet. And the wording of the Annexes, which are part of the Agreement, is clearly potentially in conflict with the binding Pelindaba Treaty for a Nuclear Arms Free Africa, something VPM Paul Bérenger should understand perfectly well, having been at the time in charge of the notorious “dotted lines” around Chagos at the time of this UN Treaty being set up. The Starmer-Ramgoolam Agreement, in its first dozen words, rubs out the said “dotted lines” of the Treaty, meaning Pelindaba will now definitely cover Chagos, and Mauritius or any other country in the Treaty, can thus call for IAEA inspectors, for example. The endless effects of the colonial crimes of continued military occupation thus continue.

And, the Agreement also represents a victory for Chagossians, who were so cruelly displaced by the British and Americans to make way for their hideous military base on Diego Garcia. That people born there can visit, and even decide to settle in some places is cause for celebration, too. We celebrate for those born there, who have for so long craved this possibility. But the conditions specified in the Annexes are like those of military occupation. The Agreement is far from meaning “the right of return” for Chagossians, or “the freedom of movement” for all Mauritians including Chagossians. There will be draconian restrictions over the whole of Chagos concerning “base safety” – not just concerning Diego Garcia but concerning “Chagos Archipelago beyond Diego Garcia” as the Agreement refers to the other Islands, like Peros Banos and Salomon. Any and all decisions about the whole of Chagos will be regimented and controlled tightly by the British and the USA. All will be controlled by means by a “Joint Commission” of the UK and Mauritius, with the USA sitting in and able to “provide advice” on “the long-term, secure and effective operation of the Base”, which is the leitmotif of the Agreement. Chagossians will only be able to settle on those parts of Chagos where a minority of Chagossians are from. Even the very word “re-settlement” is a colonial term, not at all the same as the “right of return” or of “freedom of movement”. The Agreement has no mention of any reparations for 57 years’ illegal military occupation of Mauritian territory, nor even reparations for the Chagossians actually removed from there by force to make way for the military base.

Of course in LALIT, we have for nearly 50 years now, consciously aimed at the complete decolonization of Mauritius and its reunification, the right of return and free circulation of Chagossians and free movement for Mauritians, and the closure of the USA military base on Diego Garcia. These three elements are key to the real victory, which we still have not won. Not yet.

And the Agreement represents a set-back, in the short run, to the struggle to close down the military base on Diego Garcia – and this comes at a time in history, when the USA’s whole empire is already in the process of its cascading collapse into its own debts and political bankruptcy. Mauritius finds itself tied to the apron strings of a failing empire, as it falls.

So, while we can relish the admission in writing by the UK, and its ally the USA, which is in on the deal, that “Mauritius is sovereign over the Chagos Archipelago in its entirety, including Diego Garcia” as the first 13 words read, and we can celebrate with happiness that Chagossians may be a bit freer to visit and settle on parts of Chagos under heavy bureaucratic and military supervision, we are also well aware of the set-back, in the short run, to the struggle to close the base. Not that any number of dollars or pounds would make us give up on the struggle to close down all foreign military bases, and close ports, while at it, to all military ships! But, the good news is that the USA will soon, as it bankrupts itself, be forced to close all 800 of its foreign military bases, and become an ordinary country.

And, at the same time, because of the UK-USA’s tight control over the Diego Garcia base, we note that the Agreement is really no more than a new “legal fig-leaf” to cover the original sin of colonization and land-theft for another 100 years, 100 years for a start, that is. We are enjoying the imminent dismantling on the spot of the previous “legal fig-leaf” that had the name “British Indian Ocean Territories”. Good riddance.

But it did not evaporate all by itself.

Nor did one or two Mauritian Prime Ministers, or even three or four, get rid of BIOT.

The Mauritian State only very belatedly did rather too little too late to end this illegal occupation.

The changes are coming after, and as a direct result of, the change in the balance of social forces, built up over 50 years of brave struggle, of tough political battles, of street fights of Chagossian women and LALIT women with Riot Police in Port Louis, of hunger strikes by Chagossian women, of fighting criminal charges for illegal demonstrations, of international conferences and leaflets, of petitions and open letters to world leaders and Mauritian leaders, of speeches at international trade union meetings and resolutions at international socialist meetings on five continents, of resolutions at the world No Bases movement to decisions at the World Anti-War Meeting, of constants attempts to get ships to go to Diego Garcia – first a Greenpeace ship to go there then the beginnings of a whole flotilla to go to Diego Garcia (only thwarted by the British offer to “take” Chagossians to Chagos to look after the tombs of their dead ancestors and family members), of Court Cases the the GRC put before the UK judiciary, during one of which the British Government lawyers spent one hour attacking LALIT presumably trying to drive a wedge between LALIT and the Chagos Refugees Group, of the UK state losing at the UNCLOS tribunal, at the ICJ, and at the UN General Assembly when the UK-USA had only three countries vote with them (once Maldives had withdrawn its vote) – talk about geo-political isolation – of the UK being kicked out of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission, of being denied the right to send letters by even the Universal Postal union, of getting questioned at the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty organization. More recently, the UK-USA has panicked when all the Arab leaders have prevented the USA from overflying their countries or using the US bases on their territory in order to attack Iran as part of the Israeli state’s diabolical plan to “finish off” the genocide in Palestine.

So, the main point is that “lalit kontinye ....”

Let us take one example. In Annex 1 under the section “Chagos Archipelago beyond Diego Garcia”, and under the sub-heading “Mauritius Security Review”, the Agreement says: “4. Before approving or proceeding with a proposal for:” ... “b. any proposal for development in the land territory of the Chagos Archipelago beyond Diego Garcia, Mauritius shall conduct a Security Review in accordance with paragraph 6.” Paragraph 6 then ties Mauritius’ hands to UK and USA’s considerations on the effect of any such development of the other islands, like Peros and Salomon, on the efficiency and security of the military base on Diego Garcia .

And so, there will be challenging struggles ahead in getting our country unified, in arranging for the free movement for all Chagossians, and of all in the Republic, over all the land and sea, and for the closure and clean-up of the US military base on Diego. This way we also contribute to ending the genocide against the people of Palestine right now, even as Trump funds and uses Diego Garcia in his support for this heinous genocide.

LALIT

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[1] Url: https://www.lalitmauritius.org/en/newsarticle/3593/lalit-on-the-uk-mauritius-agreement-on-chagos-including-diego-garcia/

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