One of the many surprising takeaways from the Trump-Starmer meeting in the Oval Office was the apparent willingness of the new administration to approve the recent treaty between Britain and Mauritius on the future of a UK-US military base on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.
Many on the right, notably Nigel Farage and Kemi Badenoch, confidently predicted that Trump would denounce the deal and chastise the prime minister.
Instead, Trump said: “We’re going to have some discussions about that very soon, and I have a feeling it’s going to work out very well.” He added that it was a “very long-term, powerful lease, a very strong lease” and that “I think we’ll be inclined to go along with your country”.
Broadly speaking, it is that UK sovereignty over the British Indian Ocean Territory (Biot), which comprises the US military base on Diego Garcia and the other Chagos Islands, is not recognised in international law and the United Nations. This means its status is unsettled, and subject to continual legal actions, complicated by separate, but obviously related, attempts by the Chagossians forced from their homes in the 1960s to accommodate the base, to gain redress. If the UK, and, by extension, the US, were to be prepared to ignore (non-binding) rulings by the International Court and the United Nations then the matter would remain unresolved, if not dormant. But Britain and America appear determined to make the base “honest”.
The Biot is a fairly modern confection, created out of the territory of what was the British crown colony of Mauritius in 1965. It has no permanent residents, for example. As Mauritius and its associated islands, under British rule since 1814, was heading for independence in 1964, the US enquired about setting up a multi-functional military facility on Diego Garcia – air, naval, surveillance and intelligence. The British readily agreed, and told the putative Mauritian leaders that they could only gain complete self-rule if they relinquished any claim on the Chagos Islands, accepted £3m in compensation (about £50m today, and later increased) and the forced removal of the inhabitants. This they did. Mauritius became independent in 1968, but subsequently disowned the forced agreement, and renewed their claim of sovereignty.
Even then it was clear that it violated a 1960 UN resolution prohibiting a colonial power from partitioning a territory in return for independence. It has weak standing in international law.
We don’t know for sure, because the final details are yet to be published. The draft treaty concluded last year envisaged Mauritius gaining/regaining sovereignty over the Biot in return for £9bn over the lifespan of the 99-year leaseback to the UK, and the British government’s sub-tenants, the US Department of Defense. It is not the annual fee. However, after that was provisionally agreed, a new Mauritian government was elected, and demanded a renegotiation of the terms – the money being paid over earlier and linked to inflation. This is where the £18bn figure derives from – but it could stretch over a period of 140 years, depending on an agreed timetable. If it was heavily front-loaded then it might be financed from the UK defence budget, possibly eroding to some extent the extra £6bn a year committed this week.
They aren’t doing the leasing. Any charge-back to them hasn’t emerged into the public domain. Under international law the Biot couldn’t be transferred or sold to them.
Theoretically, because sovereignty is discounted and Mauritius could sign a lease agreement over the Chagos Islands with Beijing, and the Chinese navy might hang around to harass the Americans. Yet it’s hard to see the Mauritians reneging on the deal and using the Chinese military to take over the US base. India is the more interested regional superpower in any case.
They are trying not to be outflanked by Reform UK on their patriotic credentials. Badenoch has tried to make capital out of saying Britain should not be giving Mauritius any money, and that Starmer’s weakness means that the Chinese might somehow take the base over.
However, her attempts to leverage the issue have failed for four powerful reasons. First, the details of the Biot treaty remain unpublished and are in any case subject to parliamentary approval. Second, the Tories were engaged in talks with Mauritius over a deal for years. Third, and still more damaging, Trump seems content with the outline deal. Fourth, the British public, outside the empire loyalists in the Reform UK voting base, are unmoved by such a distant, complicated and amorphous danger. The Chagos Islands are yet to register on any poll of voter concerns and, short of a Chinese invasion, are unlikely ever to do so.
Comments
Leave a Comment