Chagos Islands: UK refusal to return archipelago to Mauritius show the limits of international law
Miriam Bak McKenna
The UK government has failed to comply with a UN deadline to hand back the Chagos Islands in the Indian Ocean to Mauritius. The dispute is reflective of a world still grappling with its unresolved colonial legacy – and the UK’s intransigence on the issue evokes echoes of a colonial attitude that continues to rear its head in parts of the international community.
The UK decided to separate the islands from Mauritius prior to the country’s independence in 1968 and subsequently evicted around 2,000 people from the archipelago in order to set up a joint military base with the US.
In an advisory opinion on the sovereignty of the Chagos Islands published in February 2019, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found the separation of islands in 1965 was in contravention of international law. The court urged the UK to end “its administration of the Chagos Islands as rapidly as possibleâ€.
Read more at: https://theconversation.com/chagos-islands-uk-refusal-to-return-archipelago-to-mauritius-show-the-limits-of-international-law-127650
So, basically, nothing has happened, revisiting the topic from last week.
