The UK Chagos Support Association

In an article in this week’s Mauritius Times, David Snoxell, who coordinates the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Chagos, argues that negotiation and compromise offer the only way out of the current impasse between the British and Mauritian governments.

The UK government faces a protracted legal battle as a result of the previous government’s decisions in 2004 and 2010 to use royal orders to overturn a court decision in favour of the islanders’ right to return, and to introduce a marine reserve that made resettlement all but impossible.

The Orders in Council of 2004 are being challenged by the Chagossians at the European Court of Human Rights, while the creation of the Marine Protected Area is now subject to a judicial review, as well as being challenged by Mauritius at the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.

Instead of getting bogged down in endless legal battles, Snoxell says matters could be resolved more quickly, more easily and more fairly in bilateral talks. “The onus rests with the British government,” he writes. “They could propose to Mauritius a resumption of the 2009 bilateral talks which Mauritius suspended over the MPA row, but this time with the aim of reaching an across the board resolution of the issues. The future of the islands and that of the Chagossians, the right of return, the MPA and sovereignty cannot be excluded from the agenda and ministers must be engaged… The only sensible way forward is through negotiation and compromise.”

An aerial view of Diego Garcia (copyright holder unknown)

Great piece in the Telegraph at the weekend about this Thursday’s conference on the future of the Chagos islands.

The people of Chagos have faced secrecy and deceit from successive governments. Thursday will be a great opportunity to have a proper open discussion and learn how conservation can go hand in hand with the rights of the Chagossians.

The Sunday Telegraph ran a couple of encouraging responses to Ben Fogle’s article on Chagos the previous week, including one from David Snoxell, who co-ordinates the Chagos APPG:

SIR – Coming from a leading conservationist, Ben Fogle’s passionate advocacy of the right of the Chagos islanders (News Review, February 13) to live in their homeland is of tremendous encouragement to them.

The Marine Protected Area is clearly of immense value for the protection of the unique Chagos Archipelago, but must not be at the expense of its former inhabitants or Mauritius, to whom the islands will in time be returned.

WikiLeaks has revealed that a motive for the Marine Protected Area, designated by the last Labour government, was to block the return of the islanders, even though they would make ideal guardians of their own environment.

Before coming to power, both the Conservatives and the Lib Dems were highly supportive of the Chagossians and promised a just and fair settlement. Nine months later, there is little sign of progress towards that goal, despite widespread support for an overall settlement from parliamentarians and the public. Ministers should listen to those views just as much as they listen to officials in the Foreign Office.

David Snoxell
Co-ordinator, Chagos Islands All Party Parliamentary Group
High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire

SIR – Ben Fogle’s article on the Chagos islanders’ eviction in 1971 from their home needs our support. I did write to my MP a few years ago, but nothing happened. I would urge others to do this, as the treatment of these people is a disgrace.

Alan Tolley
Lincoln

This is a statement from David Snoxell, co-ordinator of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Chagos.

1971 and 2004 apart, 2010 was the worst year I can remember for deception and disillusionment. It started with the rushed PR consultation exercise leading to the sudden designation of a Marine Protection Area, just before the Easter recess (despite the 253,000 Avaaz  and 1,600 MET petitioners who called for the Foreign Secretary to work with the Chagossians and Mauritius); the emergency debates which the designation triggered in both Houses on 6 April; the revelations in The Times of 22 April (‘Paradise dossier was doctored to keep deported families from their homes’); the Coalition promises in opposition to restore the right to return and work for a fair and just settlement; the Foreign Secretary’s meeting with Dr Philippa Gregory on 9 July in which he said that whilst he had taken no decision concerning the future of the Islanders it appeared  that the best solution would be for the Chagos people to return to the Outer Islands; the undermining of Coalition commitments by the FCO during the August recess; the brief elation when on 9 September Vince Cable announced that  the  Government was dropping the case at Strasbourg and that steps were being taken to ensure the return of the Chagossians, quickly overturned by the FCO; and finally the revelations on 2 December in the US Embassy cable, demonstrating that the British Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago) Commissioner and Administrator from the Overseas Territories Department of the Foreign Office saw the MPA as a means of preventing resettlement.  Then on 21 December Mauritius announced that it had taken a case against the UK to ITLOS (International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea) on the grounds that the MPA was not compatible with the UN Convention for a number of reasons, including that the leak of the US cable showed that a motive for the MPA was to make resettlement impossible. There is also an application from Olivier Bancoult to the English Courts for a Judicial Review of the MPA which a judge in November postponed until after the case in Strasbourg has been decided.As for 2011 it is to be hoped that the Coalition Government will honour its commitment to the Chagossians of a fair and just settlement.  Clearly the ball needs to be rescued from the legal long grass and the only sensible way forward is a pragmatic resolution of the issues with all the parties, through patient diplomacy and negotiation.

Our full January update is now online here.