The UK has announced it is giving up sovereignty of a remote but strategically important cluster of islands in the Indian Ocean after more than half a century.
The UK has announced it is giving up sovereignty of a remote but strategically important cluster of islands in the Indian Ocean after more than half a century.
So, they're going to be "sovereign" over the whole archipelago, but only as long as they don't exercise their sovereignty over the largest island in it which constitutes more than half of its total land area (30 km2 of 56.13 km2).
From today's Joint statement between the governments of the Republic of Mauritius and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland concerning the Chagos Archipelago, including Diego Garcia:
Nice touch making a new "Marine Protected Area" in the process; the current "Chagos Marine Protected Area" was created entirely to, well... lets let this 2009 US diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks explain:
I wonder how the "treaty will address wrongs of the past"; somehow I doubt it will involve any mention of the CIA torture site there.
This is such a fucking scam, Jesus Christ. No wonder my immediate response to this news was "That was a lot sooner than I expected!" — no, it's still gonna be a long time yet before the Brits and Seps will actually concede their rule of Diego Garcia in any meaningful way. This agreement is as good as toilet paper.
I wonder when Lalit is gonna make a statement about this agreement.