The Chagossians
WHO WAS RESPONSIBLE FOR THE REMOVAL OF THE ISLANDERS?
Deportation
"There is nothing wrong in law or in principle to enacting an immigration law which enables the Commissioner to deport inhabitants of BIOT. Even in international law there is no established rule that a citizen has a right to enter or remain in his country of origin/birth/nationality etc. A provision to this effect is contained in Protocol No 4 to the European Convention on Human Rights but that has not been ratified by us, and thus we do not regard the UK as bound by such a rule. In this respect we are able to make up the rules as we go along and treat the inhabitants of BIOT as not ‘belonging’ to it in any sense."
So reads a secret minute written by a Foreign Office lawyer (Anthony Aust) on 23 October 1968 when plans were being drawn up to deport the Chagossians from their homeland to make way for a US military base on the island of Diego Garcia.
The detachment of the Chagos Islands from the colony of Mauritius had been carried out 3 years earlier in defiance of the United Nations General Assembly Declaration 1514(XV) which called upon colonial powers to give complete independence to former colonies without alteration of their borders. The UK neglected this and the requirement: "to transfer all powers to those peoples ….without any conditions or reservations" and instead created a new colony - the British Indian Ocean Territory. This prompted the UN to pass General Resolution 2066:
" Noting with deep concern that any step taken by the administering Power to detach certain islands from the Territory of Mauritius for the purpose of establishing a military base would be in contravention of the Declaration [1514 (XV)] …Invites the administering Power to take no action which would dismember the Territory of Mauritius and violate its territorial integrity."
Nonetheless, the British Government pressed ahead with their plans for the new colony, and on 30 December 1966 signed an 'Exchange of Notes' with the US Government, granting the US the rights to use the whole of the archipelago for defence purposes for an indefinite period. This was initially to be 50 years until 2016 with automatic renewal for a further 20 years. The agreement no w terminates in 2036.
The fate of the islands was sealed and the indigenous Chagossians (Ilois) were initially prevented from travelling back to the Chagos from visits to Mauritius and were finally deported between 1971 and 1973.
The school, Diego Garcia, 1964 - one year before the Chagos Islands were detached from Mauritius to create the new colony of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT). (photo credit Andrew Nunn)
John Todd announces the closure of Diego Garcia in 1971
Words written by the Manager of the last Plantation on Ile du Coin, Peros Banhos just before the removal of the islanders in 1973 (photo credit Mark Spalding)
The Role of the United States
It has long been thought that the US played a central role in the removal of the Chagossians by demanding that the territory should be free of inhabitants. Recent research, however suggests that this is not true.
David Snoxell 1 wrote in 2009, "Although the US was looking for an uninhabited island to serve as a base, there is no available evidence that they insisted on the depopulation of all the islands. It was British officials who were the instigators of this policy, albeit with American concurrence."
Evidence has now been found in government papers which confirms this. Whilst the US undoubtedly required Diego Garcia to be depopulated, the removal of the remaining population from Peros Banhos and Salomon was entirely at the behest of the British Government.
When the US Government informed Britain in 1968 that it intended to go ahead with construction on Diego Garcia and asked for that island to be cleared of its inhabitants, FCO officials prepared a briefing to the Prime Minister on what to do with the Chagos Islanders and in particular the Ilois.
One idea that emerged was that it might be possible to retain a viable plantation industry in the Outer Islands (Peros Banhos and Salomon Atolls) but that to do this would require longer-term investment. The US Government were approached for an agreement to a 20 year investment plan which would preclude their use of these islands in the future. They replied firmly, in a letter dated 22 Feb 1969, that they could not agree to this. Indeed, it is hard conceive that the US would have been in a position, little more than 2 years after concluding a defence agreement (1966 Exchange of Notes) and before they had even persuaded US Congress to vote the money for defence facilities on Diego Garcia, to vary the terms of that agreement to preclude their access to other islands in the BIOT. Their letter was little more than a reminder to the UK of what had been agreed.
At the time that this letter was written, the FCO was preparing a number of Working Papers on the BIOT. These Papers discuss the population problems in graphic terms. For example, they acknowledge that Ilois had their permanent homes in Chagos and a therefore substantial connection, including 'belonger' rights as far as entry was concerned, and that children born on the islands after Mauritian independence (12 March 1968) were solely citizens of the UK & Colonies ( a particular problem because they "could truly claim to be 'belongers' " unless "we take steps to remove the Ilois outside BIOT").
What emerges from the official papers is that the overriding factor in the UK decision to depopulate the Chagos was driven by a fear that: "By permitting the establishment of what would become a permanent population we would be making ourselves liable to substantial future expenditure on administration and social services and to United Nations obligations".
Accordingly FCO officials advised the Foreign Secretary to seek the Prime Minister's approval for the complete removal of the population. The Foreign Secretary's letter of 21 April 1969 asked the Prime Minister to approve a decision that "We should aim at the return of the inhabitants of the whole Chagos Archipelago to the Seychelles and Mauritius". The PM agreed to this on 26 April 1969.
Ten years later a letter 2 from the East African Department of the FCO to the British High Commissioner in Mauritius recounts that: "Our agreement with them [US] leading to the 1966 Exchange of Notes required only Diego Garcia to be empty. They had no objections to the other Chagos Islands remaining populated; it was our decision to clear the lot and resettle in Mauritius."
US Seabees landing on Diego Garcia 20 March 1971 (photo credit Tony Hutson)
How Many Chagossians were Removed from the Chagos Islands?
Examination of HM Government files in the National Archives at Kew have allowed researchers to build a reasonably accurate picture of the removal of the population from the Chagos. They concluded that:
By 1973, all the inhabitants had been removed by the British Government to make way for a US Military Base on one of the islands, Diego Garcia. Although the recorded population of the Chagos in the early 1960s before the formation of the British Indian Ocean Territory did not exceed 1,000 at any one time, the nature of the society and their links to colonial Mauritius masked the true numbers who had been born on and lived in the islands and were entitled to consider themselves native islanders or ‘Ilois’ and whose employment and lifestyle involved a freedom of movement between Mauritius and the Chagos. The size and nature of the Ilois were deliberately manipulated and concealed by British colonial officials in order to avoid scrutiny by the United Nations. By comparing the best available contemporary records and government archives, we conclusively demonstrate that the policy of the British Government drove between 1,328 and 1,522 Ilois into exile and poverty on Mauritius, and a further 232 on the Seychelles.
The full paper can be found in the academic journal Population Space & Place: Gifford,R. & Dunne,R.P - A Dispossessed People: the Depopulation of the Chagos Archipelago 1965–1973 (PSP). Copies of the paper are available on request (e-mail: RichardPDunne@aol.com).
Robert Lemaitre, aged 82 years, a retired docker and fisherman from Salomon with his grandson. Roiche Bois, Port Louis, Mauritius November 2005
Exile in Mauritius
In 1983 Sean Carey visited Mauritius where he talked to exiled Chagossians, his report appeared in Africa Now in the same year: Carey 1983 Africa Now.pdf
Further Reading
Eviction from the Chagos Islands. Sandra J.T.M. Evers and Marry Kooy (eds.)
This book examines the history and contemporary living conditions of Chagossians who were evicted from the Chagos archipelago in the Indian Ocean to make way for a strategic U.S. military base. Chagossians were forced to resettle in Mauritius and the Seychelles, where livelihoods are poor and marginalized. Further details: Brill Publishers
House of Commons Library Standard Note "The Chagos Islanders" at: http://www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN04463 (last updated 20 April 2012).
Diego Garcia: a contrast to the Falklands. The Minority Rights Group - Report No. 54. 1985 Diego Garcia 1985 Minority Rights Group Report No 54.pdf
Links to Chagossian & Other Support Groups:
UK Chagos Support Association:
Primarily a British Support group which does political lobbying and welfare assistance on behalf of all Chagossians.
Chagos Refugees Group - based in Mauritius:
President, Olivier Bancoult based in Mauritius with a UK branch in Crawley, Sussex run by Sabrina Jean.
Chagossian Social Committee: (no website)
President, the recently deceased Fernand Mandarin, based in Mauritius, now closely aligned to the CRG, if not already amalgamated.
Chagos Islands Community Association (CICA):
Chairperson, Hengride Permal, based in Crawley, in opposition to DGCIC, but now appears to be moribund.
Chagos Islanders Welfare Group (CIWG) (no website):
Chairperson, Isabelle Charlot (Croydon) succeeded Frankie Bontemps (Crawley). Group formed in early 2011. See below the Chagos Islanders Movement.
Chagos Islanders Movement (CIM):
President: Isabelle Charlot. Secretary: Mr Jean-Paul France. Based in the UK in Crawley & Purley.
The CIM was constituted on 24 March 2017 from former members of the Chagos Islanders Welfare Group (CWIG). It would appear that CWIG ceased to exits from that date.
Chagossian Social Committee (Seychelles): (no Website)
Chairman, Pierre Prosper.
Crawley British Chagossian Community: (no Website)
Secretary: Jenny Bertrand. Manchester Representative: Claudia Naraina. Appears to have emerged in 2016.
Labour Friends of Chagos Islanders
Chagossian Voices (no website)
This is a group, based in Crawley, Sussex, UK which emerged in 2020. Its team includes Frankie Bontemps. On 5 December 2020 it held a webinar: Webinar
BIOT Citizens (and: Facebook Site )
BIOT Citizens are a relatively new group which claims to be a representative platform of persons of Chagossian heritage resident in the United Kingdom, Mauritius and the Seychelles which works for self-determination of Chagossians.
Page last edited: 21 Nov 2021