Keir Starmer is facing humiliation on the international stage after experts at the United Nations (UN) called for his controversial deal with Mauritius on the Chagos Islands to be suspended.
UN special rapporteurs Nicolas Levrat, KP Ashwini, Bernard Duhaime, and Bina D'Costa have slammed the agreement, which hands back sovereignty of the archipelago to Mauritius and leases back the UK-US military base on Diego Garcia for £101m per year for 99 years, for failing to protect the rights of Chagossians.
It follows Sir Keir’s government moving rapidly last month to prevent a High Court appeal against the treaty by representatives of the Chagossian community, who had opposed the deal.
Now, the prime minister is under pressure from critics on all sides to suspend the deal just weeks after he signed it with Mauritius.
The attack from the UN comes as the Tories have tabled legislation in parliament to block the deal from coming into law.
In a statement on Tuesday the UN experts said: “By maintaining a foreign military presence of the United Kingdom and the United States on Diego Garcia and preventing the Chagossian people from returning to Diego Garcia, the agreement appears to be at variance with the Chagossians’ right to return, which also hinders their ability to exercise their cultural rights in accessing their ancestral lands from which they were expelled.”
They added: “In light of these significant concerns, we call for the ratification of the agreement to be suspended and for a new agreement to be negotiated that fully guarantees the rights of the Chagossian people to return to all islands of the Chagos Archipelago, including Diego Garcia. This includes their right to adequate and effective remedy and reparations, including restitution, satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition, as well as their cultural rights.”
The deal is also being criticised in the UK for potentially undermining the UK/US base on Diego Garcia, which is seen as crucial to western defence.
While the government claimed that the overall cost would be £3bn for the taxpayer, critics have estimated that over the 99-year lease period, it will cost £30bn potentially eating up the extra spending on the defence budget.
Sir Keir and Foreign Secretary David Lammy have maintained that they had to do the deal because a ruling by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) that the islands should be handed back to Mauritius threatened the existence of the crucial military airbase.
They warned that the UK would face a number of legal challenges which could make the operation of the base of Diego Garcia impossible.
The deal was signed after Donald Trump gave it his blessing, despite lobbying from Nigel Farage.
But the UN experts were highly critical of the government’s refusal to properly engage with Chagossians who have been made homeless by their removal from Diego Garcia and the impact of the deal.
They said: “We are gravely concerned about the lack of meaningful participation of Chagossians in processes that have led to the agreement.”
Government figures pointed to the UN special rapporteurs’ roles as independent experts, adding that “their views are not binding and do not represent the views of the UN system as a whole”.
And a Foreign Office spokesman said: “The negotiations were between the UK and Mauritius with our priority being to secure the full operation of the base on Diego Garcia, and the deal has been welcomed by international organisations including the UN Secretary General, African Union and Commonwealth.
“We recognise the importance of the islands to Chagossians and have worked to ensure the agreement reflects this."
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