Washington, D.C., 19 February (H.S.): President Donald Trump issued a stark public admonition to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Wednesday, via his Truth Social platform, urging London to retain unequivocal sovereignty over the strategic Diego Garcia atoll in the Indian Ocean and decrying any prospective cession to Mauritius as a perilous capitulation that imperils allied security interests.
This vehement intervention, coinciding with escalating US deliberations on potential military reprisals against Iran following Tehran's lethal suppression of demonstrations and faltering nuclear parleys in Geneva, underscored Diego Garcia's indispensability as a forward-operating hub—potentially alongside RAF Fairford—for precision airstrikes should Tehran spurn concessions on its atomic ambitions.
Trump dismissed Chagossian repatriation claims as fictitious, castigating the mooted 99-year lease arrangement—initially endorsed by Secretary of State Marco Rubio—as an untenable concession to wokeism, despite the State Department's concurrent affirmation of the pact and imminent tripartite consultations with Mauritius to safeguard base viability.
A Foreign Office spokesperson rebutted that the accord unequivocally secures the joint facility's longevity, averting existential legal jeopardy from International Court of Justice strictures, while White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt affirmed the missive as definitive administration policy, exposing intra-executive dissonance after Trump's prior equivocations—from initial approbation post-Starmer colloquy to branding it great stupidity.
This contretemps revives colonial-era frictions, with Britain having excised the Chagos archipelago upon Mauritian independence in 1968, forcibly displacing indigenous populations whose protracted litigations precipitated the diplomatic dénouement now fracturing transatlantic rapport at a moment of acute geopolitical friction.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
