Labours Chagos Deal Falls Apart Following Trumps Comments

Labour’s plan to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius is in tatters after Donald Trump branded it “ridiculous”.

The US president sounded the death knell for the controversial plan following talks with Andy Burnham at the UN General Assembly in New York.

The UK government announced last year – when Keir Starmer was still PM – that it was going to hand sovereignty of the islands to Mauritius.

Britain would also pay £9 billion over the next 99 years so the UK-US military base at Diego Garcia can continue to operate as it does at the moment.

Trump initially backed the deal, but after a series of flip-flops is now firmly opposed to it.

As Burnham looked on, he said: “I don’t support it. I think it’s a terrible deal.

“They all of a sudden say they have ownership, somebody has ownership that never showed up before after decades and centuries. I think it’s ridiculous. No, we were talking about that.

“It’s strategically very important, very important. You know, we had to send our B-2 bombers when we bombed the Iran nuclear, we sent the B-2 bombers back home to Missouri. As opposed to flying for a short period of time, they had to fly for a long period of time.

“It’s amazing how strategic it is, and I think the prime minister is going to be looking at it.”

On Wednesday, Streeting confirmed that the deal cannot go ahead as originally planned.

He told Radio 4’s Today programme: “This deal, as it is currently constituted, can’t go ahead without American support, so we have to get the deal to a place where it commands American support as well as the agreement of the government of Mauritius and our government.

“The reason why that is important is because we are trying to safeguard not just now but for the longer term the base at Diego Garcia and the capability it provides the United Kingdom and the United States for our national and collective security.”

Asked if the UK would pay Mauritius £120 million a year, as the deal said, Streeting replied: “Not at this stage. We’ve got to get to a point where we can agree a deal.”

Shadow defence secretary James Cartlidge said: “It shouldn’t have taken another intervention from the president for Andy Burnham to ‘review’ Labour’s Chagos surrender deal.

“If Burnham was really serious about our defence he would know that this deal should be binned entirely. It is absurd to hand over British sovereign territory, not to mention billions of pounds of hard-pressed taxpayers money, to an ally of China.”

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