from HANSLEY NABAB in Port Louis, Mauritius
Mauritius Bureau
PORT LOUIS, (CAJ News) – THE forced displacement of indigenous communities in Chagos, by the United Kingdom (UK) and United States (US) governments, has been denounced as a crime against humanity.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) also cited the UK’s racial persecution and continued blocking of Chagossian people from returning to their homes.
HRW is demanding that both governments (the UK & US) provide full reparations to the Chagossian people, including their right to return to live in their homeland in the Chagos archipelago in the Indian Ocean.
The Chagossians, are an indigenous people who the UK and US forced from their homes in the 1960s and 1970s so that a US military base could be built on Diego Garcia, the largest of the islands.
They abandoned the expelled Chagossians in Mauritius or Seychelles.
The UK, with US support, has prevented the Chagossians from returning home despite an international ruling against the two countries.
Although the UK and Mauritius announced negotiations on the future of Chagos in November 2022, there has been no clear commitment to meaningful consultation with the Chagossians and to guarantee their right to reparations, including their right to return.
“The UK is today committing an appalling colonial crime, treating all Chagossians as a people without rights,” said Clive Baldwin, senior legal adviser at HRW.
Who MUST stop with immediate effect the UK-US alliance of evil increasingly committing greatest crimes against humanity
“The UK and the US, who together expelled the Chagossians from their homes, should provide full reparations for the harm they have caused,” he added.
HRW has urged the government of Mauritius to publicly commit to support the return of all Chagossians, regardless of their nationality or current residence.
In 2019, the United Nations General Assembly debated and adopted a resolution that affirmed that the Chagos archipelago “forms an integral part of the territory of Mauritius.”
Baldwin said the Chagossian story over the past 50 years is one of struggle and survival.
“The UK and US governments should right the wrongs against them starting with the political and financial commitment to return the Chagossians to their homeland with dignity,” he said.
– CAJ News