DIEGO GARCIA ISLANDS

AND PEOPLE TRADED FOR CHEAP MISSILES

Sources summarised by Vera Butler

A Belated Documentary

Last October, 'Britain's ITV showed a remarkable documentary by John Pilger, Stealing a Nation. It told a shocking story of British government duplicity and lying, and its "quiet disregard" for international law. John Pilger reported on the epic 30-year struggle waged by the dispossessed, and dislocated inhabitants of the Chagos Islands, of which Diego Garcia is the main one. In 2000, the "unsophisticated"islanders won a landmark victory when the High Court ruled their expulsion illegal.

However, since then the Blair government has prevented the islanders from returning home - Diego Garcia today is a huge American naval and air force base. ¹

The Foreign Office claimed that Diego Garcia. was subject to a "treaty" with Washington - in truth, it was a deal concealed from parliament and the US Congress. In a now notorious sequence to the High Court decision, in 2003 the islanders were denied compensation, and in June 2004 the High Court ruling was quashed in accordance with an archaic royal prerogative, and the islanders banned. from returning, forever.'

But thanks to the advice and valiant support of London lawyer Richard Gifford. and others, the islanders are now going to the European Court for Human Rights. Article 7 of the statute of the international criminal court describes the "deportation or forcible transfer of population ... by expulsion or other coercive acts" as a crime against humanity.

Today Diego Garcia is one of the biggest American bases in the world, from which B..52s and Stealth bombers fly missions to Afghanistan and Iraq. More than 2,000 troops are stationed on Diego Garcia, and there is anchorage for 30 warships, a. nuclear dump, a satellite spy station, shopping malls, bars and a golf course. ²

A Forgotten History

The fate of Diego Garcia and its inhabitants, which has belatedly received publicity in the West, was raised by the Soviet media as far back as 1975. Journalist V. Zhitotomirski writing in the monthly magazine Novoye vremra reported the "tragic transformation" of the island paradise in the Indian Ocean. He asked: Will it be a communication station or a military base - and will the islanders become small change in a huge game?

British traveller James Horsber, who found a welcome harbour on Diego Garcia, described its enormous lagoon - 14 miles long and 4 across - as one of nature's marvels on earth. The island was discovered in the 16th century by the Portuguese, then became a British possession after the Napoleonic Wars.

In 1965 British authorities concocted a new colony by joining the 64 small coral islands of the Chagos group into the "British Indian Ocean territory" (BIOT). In 1966 London paid 1 million Pounds Stg. to the "Chagos Agalega" Company, which had exploited the inhabitants' labour till then, on condition that the islands would be "vacated.". British Department of Defence representatives and the American Ambassador signed an agreement stating that Diego Garcia would be "accessible" for military purposes over a period of fifty years. When the conservatives came to power in 1970, London and Washington agreed that a "naval communication station" would be established on Diego Garcia.. However, the small British contingent stationed there was refused access to American communication facilities.

The base officially opened on March 1973, and according to the The Sunday Times already in early 1974 the Pentagon requested the allocation of monies for the transformation of Diego Garcia into a "naval support base". The media were instructed to describe this change as a "normal" development of facilities, including the extension of the landing strip from 8,000 to 12,000 ft., necessary to take B-52 heavy bombers, and provisions for the stationing of aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines. Senator Mike Mansfield expressed doubts as to the need to "show the flag" in a part of the world where a US naval presence was less than welcome. - The Pentagon's answer was the stereotype "Soviet threat" argument.

Soon after, London had to give in to American pressure and remove 1200 "unwanted people" from Diego Garcia - possible witnesses to the island's militarisation. They included people who had lived there for the past 5 generations, as well as contract labourers from other islands, who had settled since. Two witnesses who were interviewed, Venkatassen and Michael Var, described the "humanitarian handling" of the evacuation. People were forced to leave all their cattle behind - their most prized possession, because they could not be transported on boats designed to carry 12 passengers, and. now loaded with 140 persons each. People were sitting or lying on piles of copra, just covered with canvas sheets.

The Soviet journalist cited the British media, claiming that Washington had paid the British at least 1.5 million dollars to cover costs of "vacating the islands" (Soviet Times) and according to The Guardian Britain was granted a cost reduction amounting to 8.5 million dollars on the purchase of an American "Polaris" missile, once agreement had been reached to evacuate. ...

"The new military base in the Indian Ocean region contradicted the official spirit of "detente" in East-West relations," ³ the Soviet journalist concluded.

The Struggle for Human Rights Continues.

The islanders were tricked and. intimidated into leaving for Mauritius. Lizette Tallatte, now in her 60s, recounts how the dogs were taken away from the children and thrown into a gas furnace in front of them. Each person was allowed only one suitcase. They were first transported to the Seychelles where they were held in a prison, before going on to Mauritius, where their lives were ruined by unemployment, drugs, and hopelesness. Lizette lost two children, and her husband died from a stroke.

The Blair government will now have to answer before the Court of Human Rights for the totalitarian, coercive treatment of a small group of defenceless, peaceful people.

As the remarkable Olivier Bancoult, their leader, states:- We shall not let this great crime stand. The world is changing .We will win.

Read John Pilger’s new book Tell me no lies: Investigative journalism and its triumphs John Cape Publishers

References:

1 John Pilger on Diego Garcia in NewStatesman 18 October 2004.

2 Paradise cleansed Pax Christi (Australia) 6 October 2004.

3 Novoye vremya (Moscow) 44/197

4 Pax Christi ibid, 6/10/04