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The British government’s plans to hand control of the strategically significant Chagos Islands to Mauritius are set to be signed off on Thursday, after an 11th-hour legal injunction failed to stop an effort that has been intensely controversial in both the United Kingdom and the United States. Prime Minister Keir Starmer intends to return the islands to the African country, while maintaining control of the US-UK Diego Garcia military base, and the deal is expected be finalized on Thursday. It comes after a High Court judge briefly blocked the move in a ruling made at 2 a.m. local time (9...

@benrileysmith Breaking: Donald Trump tells @Telegraph in the Oval Office he is minded to sign off the Chagos Islands deal. Big win for Starmer.

More than a dozen ill-prepared migrants, including five children, were caught trying to illegally cross into Canada in below-freezing weather that could have claimed their lives, officials said. Alberta police intercepted four adults and five children from Venezuela who were trudging their suitcases through the snow in bone-chilling temperatures of minus-22 degrees Fahrenheit, The Guardian reports. Canadian Police Assistant Commissioner Lisa Moreland told reporters the group was found struggling in the snow and “incredibly cold” weather, which put their lives at risk. A second group of migrants — made up of six adults from Jordan, Sudan, Chad, and Mauritius —...

WASHINGTON – Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) warned the United Kingdom that it could damage its relationship with the United States if it threatens the future of the joint U.S.-U.K. military base on the island of Diego Garcia by ceding sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius. Key excerpts of the speech are below: “Do you know who is loving all of this? China, because China has a close relationship with Mauritius. And do you know what? It is going to get a lot closer. “This is insane. This is cell-deep stupid. This is bone-deep, down-to-the-marrow stupid. Because the United Nations...

British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer’s plan to give away sovereign territory in the Indian Ocean which contains a strategically critical U.S. base is so “stupid” he must be on drugs to consider it, a Republican Senator says. President Trump and the new U.S. Secretary of State (foreign affairs minister) Marco Rubio have been briefed on the Chagos Islands situation created by the British government, says U.S. Republican Senator from Louisiana John Kennedy — no relation to President John Kennedy — and that the dictates of the United Nations should be ignored. Reminding others on the Senate floor (1hr 55m)...

The deal on the Chagos Islands ends a battle over Britain’s last overseas territory in Africa and preserves the Diego Garcia air base but has been criticized as aiding China. Britain said Thursday that it would cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius in a deal it said secured the future of the UK-U.S. Diego Garcia military base, and which could also pave the way for people displaced decades ago to return home. President Joe Biden welcomed the deal, saying it would secure the effective operation of Diego Garcia, a strategically important air base in the Indian Ocean, into...

Britain’s left-wing government announced a plan on Thursday to surrender sovereignty of a British Overseas Territory in the Indian Ocean that has hosted an important joint U.S.-UK military base and listening post for the past 50 years. The United Kingdom is giving the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, from whom it bought the archipelago in the 1960s. The announcement is the latest development in years of sovereignty claims by Mauritius, now drifting into China’s sphere of influence, which until recently were not even recognised as legitimate by the UK or its allies. Just last week, President of Mauritius Prithvirajsing Roopun barracked...

An active-duty missile corvette of the Indian Navy is on its way to Vietnam as a gift, the first warship given by India to any country. The domestically built corvette INS Kirpan left India's east coast on Wednesday (Jun 28), the navy said. India and Vietnam have strengthened their ties in recent years, with a special focus on defence, as both countries are concerned over an increasingly assertive China. India has given smaller boats and military equipment to countries like Maldives and Mauritius in the past and a submarine to Myanmar.

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...

The world's third-richest man has been accused of pulling of the 'largest con in corporate history' through the Indian-based Adani Group corporation. US investor Hindenburg Research, which has begun short selling the conglomerate through bonds, conducted a two-year probe into head Gautam Adani, who is worth $125billion. The firm alleges that Adani and his family controlled a web of offshore shell accounts that it used to carry out corruption, money laundering and taxpayer theft, all while siphoning money from the companies they owned. Adani has pulled off this gargantuan feat with the help of enablers in government and a cottage...

The Chagos Islands may be little more than specks in the middle of the Indian Ocean, but they are at the center of a looming diplomatic row over a key American military base and the rise of Chinese power. Lawmakers on both sides of the Atlantic have raised fears that the British government's decision to begin negotiations to hand over the islands to Mauritius could allow China the chance to build its own military facility on the archipelago — right under the nose of American forces at Diego Garcia. The issue is one of the most important strategic locations in...

Two Islamic extremist terrorists were sentenced to death Wednesday in Mali for carrying out one terror attack and planning two others, including the 2015 hostage crisis in which two gunmen killed 20 people at a hotel. Fawaz Ould Ahmed and Sadou Chaka pleaded guilty and expressed no remorse for the three attacks, French news agency AFP reported. Ould Ahmed, a Mauritian national, said he was personally responsible for a March 2015 attack where he shot five people at a restaurant in the Malian capital of Bamako, according to Reuters. Ould Ahmed and Chaka are best known, however, for planning the...

ROME — Pope Francis encouraged global initiatives for the protection of the environment, especially in Mauritius after a devastating oil spill threatened the livelihood of the island nation’s inhabitants and wildlife. The pope specifically mentioned a concert that was held at the cathedral in the Mauritian capital of Port-Louis. According to French news agency AFP, the cathedral square was the gathering point Aug. 29 for one of the biggest demonstrations in Mauritius’ history; an estimated 75,000 protesters demanded answers from the government regarding the environmental disaster. In late July, a Japanese bulk carrier, MV Wakashio, ran aground on a coral...

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...

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...

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...

The U.S. case against the chief financial officer of China’s Huawei Technologies, who was arrested in Canada last month, centers on the company’s suspected ties to two obscure companies. One is a telecom equipment seller that operated in Tehran; the other is that firm’s owner, a holding company registered in Mauritius. U.S. authorities allege CFO Meng Wanzhou deceived international banks into clearing transactions with Iran by claiming the two companies were independent of Huawei, when in fact Huawei controlled them. Huawei has maintained the two are independent: equipment seller Skycom Tech Co Ltd and shell company Canicula Holdings Ltd. But...

Full title: Future of controversial US military base Diego Garcia hangs in the balance after UN rules the Indian Ocean archipelago was illegally seized in the 1960s by Britain and should give be given back to Mauritius The future of a US military base constructed on a British territory in Mauritius has been thrown into doubt after a United Nations ruling on Monday. The UN's high court has ordered the United Kingdom to give the Chagos Islands back to Mauritius after an investigation revealed they'd been seized under illegal pretenses during the 1960s and 70s. This could, however, also cause...

The search consists of a 65-man vessel Seabed Constructor equipped geared to scouring the depths of the Indian Ocean for any sight of plane debris from the MH370 aircraft. But, four years after the plane went missing, the latest searches through the Indian Ocean has revealed nothing -- after 16,000sq km of the planned 25,000sq km area was combed through. The search location was pinpointed by an Australian Oceanographer as the most likely spot the plane would be. The Malaysian government paid Ocean Infinity $20 million for 5,000 square km of a successful search, $30 million for 15,000 square km,...

According to Mr McMahon's claims, the wreckage of the flight is located 16km south of Round Island, which is 22.5km north of Mauritius, in an area of the ocean that has not been searched before.