I have written in this column previously about the economically disastrous policy of our Government on the future of the British Indian Ocean Territories: Though we are saddled with debt -just shy of 100% of our annual national income- we are giving away sovereign British territory, only to lease it back for £35 billion. ( They are ashamed of our history and they hate Britain )
Little wonder, that we now shoulder the highest tax burden in our history. Whilst Mauritius, the beneficiary of our bounty, is enjoying tax cuts.
The Bill to ratify the treaty with Mauritius is currently in the House of Lords, having shamefully passed unamended in the Commons.
Now, however, The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination has waded in to the debate, demanding that the Treaty be abandoned because of its shabby treatment of the Chagossian islanders.
Future decisions on access to, and resettlement on most of the archipelago, the ancestral home of Chagossians, are now left in the hands of Mauritius, a foreign Government.
British Chagossians, those who resettled here after being removed from the archipelago, will need to become Mauritian citizens to have any hope of being eligible resettlement under any future resettlement programme to return them to the archipelago.
The reason that so many Chagossians came to Britain after leaving the archipelago, was because they felt that they were treated as second Class citizens in Mauritius. Indeed, it was a criminal offence in Mauritius even to question its sovereignty over the archipelago.
In recent weeks we’ve seen a further influx of Chagossians arriving in UK, having fled Mauritius.
The Chagossians no plan to set up their own government-in-exile in London.
Our Government have also given Mauritius an additional £40 million to set up a trust fund for the welfare of Chagossians. Yet, despite this being UK taxpayers’ money, Britain will have no representation on the board and no control over how the funds are spent. There will be just one UK-based Chagossian representative on the board, chosen not by the British Chagossian community, but by the Prime Minister of Mauritius.
With a government of so many lawyers, and so in awe of Human Rights law, how embarrassing to have their treaty challenged by the UN for the denial of Human Rights