In defending the
decision to transfer the Chagos Islands to Mauritius against Tory criticism,
the PM yesterday declared
that “the single most important thing” about the deal is that the US/UK
military base on Diego Garcia is effectively exempted from the transfer, and
the right of the Chagossians to return to the islands excludes that part of
their historic territory. It’s an interesting choice of relative importance.
He could have said
that, given the rulings against the UK in international courts, the most
important thing was that the UK was going to abide by the rule of law. It would
be a reasonably credible approach – he does, after all, claim with some
justification to have spent most of his career upholding the law. He could have
said that the most important thing was rectifying the injustice done to the
Chagossians when the UK forcibly deported
them from their own lands and homes. Justice, again, is something which he can
legitimately claim to have pursued for much of his life.
But he chose to
emphasise neither of those things. The priority, for him, was maintaining a
military base, the precise nature and purpose of which has long been unclear,
and to deny the right of the islanders to return to that part of their land in
order to do that. It turns out that, when push comes to shove, maintaining the
scattered remnants of the British Empire and the UK’s military reach are more
important to him than either the rule of law or justice for those who were unlawfully
expelled. Who needs Tory imperialists when we have Labour ones?
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