Mauritian Independence and the Excision of the Chagos
Mauritius became independent on 12 March 1968, having been required to give up part of its territory first. The island had been Dutch, then French, then British from 1810, and its population was mostly the descendants of enslaved Africans and of Indian indentured labourers brought in after abolition to cut cane. In 1965, three years before independence, Britain detached the Chagos Archipelago to form the British Indian Ocean Territory, in exchange for £3 million and an understanding that independence would follow — an arrangement the Mauritian leaders accepted under conditions they later described as duress. The purpose was a joint military base on Diego Garcia. The United States wanted the island unpopulated, and between 1968 and 1973 the entire Chagossian population, between 1,500 and 2,000 people, was removed to Mauritius and the Seychelles, some by being refused re-entry after travelling for medical treatment, others loaded onto ships after their dogs were gassed. They were given almost nothing and lived in destitution in Port Louis. Britain's own legal advice at the time described the islanders as a floating population to avoid the reporting obligations that attached to a permanent one. The International Court of Justice advised in 2019 that the detachment was unlawful and that decolonisation had not been completed, and the General Assembly voted 116 to 6 to that effect. Britain agreed in 2024 to transfer sovereignty to Mauritius while leasing the base back for ninety-nine years. Chagossians were not party to the negotiation. The islands are also the reason the case is a fixture in the law of decolonisation. A colonial power dividing a territory before granting it independence had been declared unlawful by a General Assembly resolution in 1960, five years before it was done here.
- Year: 1968 CE
- Category: Political
