Mauritius

The Chagos Archipelago comprises over 60 islands in the Indian Ocean about 2 000 km north of Mauritius – and only about 1 000 km south of the Maldives. Yet it ...

It’s clear that the interests of Mauritius and the Chagossians don’t entirely align. Uteem suggests India is being roped in as an ally of Mauritius to strengthen its claim against the Maldives on its maritime jurisdiction over the waters around the Chagos islands. And to avoid setting a precedent for similar situations in the Falklands and Gibraltar. Asked if there were significant differences between the interests of Mauritius and those of the Chagossians in this matter, he suggested there was no single Chagossian interest as the community had become so divided. Now London seems to have had a change of heart, though the contents and progress of the negotiations remain secret. [Although] this has been a very strong political and emotional issue, I don’t really see this new generation who have lived in a totally different [world] would want to go back and start from scratch because there is no economic activity at all on the other islands of the archipelago (other than Diego Garcia). Milan Meetarbhan, a constitutional expert and former Mauritian ambassador to the UN who was previously part of Mauritius’s legal team arguing this issue, told ISS Today that there had been no official mention of such a referendum. And Britain obliged – reportedly in exchange for a US$14 million discount on US Polaris missiles – by forcibly removing all the Chagossians to Mauritius, Seychelles and the UK. The International Court of Justice on 25 February 2019 and UN General Assembly Resolution 73/295 were clear that the Chagos Archipelago formed an integral part of the territory of Mauritius. They also want to be financially supported to do so, and to receive reparations for having been deprived of their homeland for over 50 years. Yet it was once part of what was then the British colony of Mauritius – until 1965 when departing Britain, in effect, purchased it from Mauritius just before the latter’s independence in 1968. Britain steadfastly insisted for decades that it was the rightful owner of what it called the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT).