The Diego Garcia depopulation controversy pertains to the expulsion of those inhabitants qualifying as indigenous from the island of Diego Garcia and the other islands of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), beginning in 1968 and concluding on 27 April 1973 with the evacuation of Peros Banhos atoll.[1] These people were known at the time as the ‘’Ilois’’; today they are known as ‘’Chagos Islanders’’, or ‘’Chagossians’’.
Some Chagossians and human rights advocates have claimed that the Chagossian right of occupation was violated by the British Foreign Office as a result of the 1966 agreement[2] between the UK and US to provide an unpopulated island for a US military base, and that additional compensation[3] and a right of return[4] be provided.
Legal action to claim compensation and the right of abode in the Chagos began in April 1973 when 280 islanders, represented by a Mauritian attorney, petitioned the Government of Mauritius to distribute the £650,000 compensation provided in 1972 by the British government for distribution by the Mauritian Government (it was not distributed until 1977).[5] In October 1974, after receiving no assistance from the Mauritian Government, a Mr. Saminaden and Mr. Michel Vincatassin presented the British High Commissioner to Mauritius with a petition detailing the lack of support the islanders had received from the Mauritian government, noting that 40 islanders had died since arriving on Mauritius, and asking for the UK Government to work on their behalf with the Mauritian Government, or to return the Ilois to the Chagos.[6]
From this initial petitioning grew a series of presentations and lawsuits culminating in the 27 March 1982 agreement among the British Government, the Mauritian Government, and the Islanders (numbering 1,419 adults and 160 minors),[7] which was intended to settle all islander claims for the sum of £4 millions in cash from the British Government and £1 million in land from the Mauritius Government.[8]
Beginning in 1983, a new series of compensation claims were made against the British Government by an Ilois group called the Chagos Refugee Group, located on Mauritius. The founders and officers formed the core of inhabitants who, beginning in 1999, brought three lawsuits to British Courts - in 1999,[9] 2002,[10] and 2006[4] - and one to an American Court in 2001,[11] all requesting additional compensation and the right of abode in the Chagos. The U.S. case and two of these three British cases were defeated on appeal, the other was not appealed[9] by the British Government.
In 2005, these same litigants filed a brief with the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which was brought before that court in 2008 following the final defeat of the final British lawsuit before the House of Lords, and that case remains in litigation as of August 2010.
The British government has consistently denied any illegalities in the expulsion. Even so, various officials (including the Foreign Minister) have apologised to the Chagossians for long-ago wrongdoing,[12] while still disputing that the deportees have a right to be repatriated at this time. On April 1, 2010, the British Cabinet announced the creation of the world’s largest Marine Protected Area (MPA) which consists of most of the Chagos Archipelago, homeland of the Chagossians.[13] The MPA will prohibit extractive industry of all kinds, including commercial fishing and oil and gas exploration. Some Chagossians have claimed that this MPA was created to prevent the islanders from returning to the islands.[14][15][16] The UK Government claims that the restrictions of the MPA will be modified pending the decision of the ECHR.[17]
