Sir Keir loses chance to kill Chagos deal
It was set to be signed today. But at 2.25am the High Court blocked this with an injunction, saying the islanders had not been properly consulted. Might it all be off?
By 1pm, the injunction had been dismissed — and the deal back on.
Rishi Sunak’s plan — had he won the election — was to find a way to junk the deal. He hoped it would collapse in one of the 15 rounds of negotiations.
His legal advice was to let this play out: walking away would mean acting in open defiance of the International Court of Justice. After all, how could the UK sign up to the court and reject its rulings? Best start the process and let this madness collapse under the weight of its own contradictions.
It was always a risky strategy. The talks proceeded perfectly and Starmer — a lawyer who is a stickler for legal protocol — was never going to go rogue at the end. Nor was Lord Hermer, his friend and attorney-general.
So the UK would keep control of the Diego Garcia military base but pay an estimated £90m ($188m) a year, linked to inflation. And the overall control of the Chagos Islands would be given to Mauritius, even though it lay 2000km away.
What no one expected was that international laws might collide with each other — specifically the law of self-determination. Two Chagossians took umbrage, saying they wanted to stay British, and sued. The Human Rights Act mandates the Foreign Office to respect the European Convention on Human Rights. Right to a family life might be violated due to the Chagossians’ ancestral ties to the islands. And, for good measure, Article 1 (property rights): transferring sovereignty without addressing land claims.
Starmer, ever the lawyer, could have had the perfect excuse to kill a deal that was both unaffordable and — with China gaining influence in the region — strategically naive. The prime minister could say that the final word had gone to the Chagossians, appallingly treated when ejected from Diego Garcia by the British in the 1960s.
The injunction was always a push. Such treaties should be a Crown prerogative: even Starmer might argue this is not a process that human rights lawyers should be able to derail. The Conservatives are furious.
Had that fury been present when this process was started, it might have even been effective. It was no surprise, in the end, that the injunction was overruled. But for ten hours, we had a glimpse of what might have been.
The Times
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For a brief moment, it looked like Sir Keir Starmer might be spared. He inherited a bizarre deal to cede British control of the Chagos islands where he would then rent the British military base in Diego Garcia at great expense.