Free Republic

Could the U.S. rest easy if its only military base in the Indian Ocean were under the sovereign authority of an African government instead of the U.K.? At center stage is Naval Support Facility Diego Garcia, a critical hub for U.S. forces. The base is the sole reason that the U.K. clings onto the 58 small Indian Ocean isles that make up the Chagos Archipelago, of which Diego Garcia is the largest. For decades, London has made Diego Garcia available to the Pentagon on the most favorable terms imaginable: no rent, few restrictions and little oversight. The island is an...

Pope Francis has accused Britain of placing greed over humanity by refusing to hand over a disputed island archipelago in the Indian Ocean to Mauritius. In an unusually muscular foreign policy intervention, the pope suggested that Britain’s failure to heed a United Nations vote calling on it relinquish sovereignty over the British Indian Ocean Territory was uncivilised. “Not all things that are right for humanity are right for our pocket, but international institutions must be obeyed,” the pope told journalists as he left Mauritius at the end of a three-nation tour of Africa. “If there is an internal dispute or...

Hundreds of Indian Ocean islanders who were forcibly deported from their homeland by Britain 40 years ago won a battle yesterday which could see them set sail for an emotional return within days. The court of appeal in London found the British government guilty of "abuse of power" for attempting to prevent the Chagos Islanders from reclaiming land leased from under their feet by Britain to the US in the 1960s. Three judges upheld a ruling in the islanders' favour last year, ordered the government to pay their legal costs and withheld support for an appeal to the House of...

LONDON (Reuters) - Indian Ocean islanders expelled by Britain to make way for a U.S. military base on Diego Garcia won the right on Thursday to go home after almost 40 years in exile. Two judges ruled in favour of the Chagos islanders who had fought a protracted legal battle with the British government, which blocked their return to the idyllic archipelago where they had eked out a living fishing and coconut farming. The 2,000 Chagossians were expelled by Britain and dumped hundreds of miles (km) away on the shores of Mauritius and Seychelles. For years they have lived as...