Fri, 23 Jul 2004

Court rejects islanders' appeal

I had, of course, heard of the huge air and naval base on Diego Garcia, but was unaware of it's genesis. This is truely a sordid tale.

As described in this background piece, also from the BBC, the US wanted a base in the Indian Ocean without a "population problem". One uninhabited island, Aldabra, was deemed ideal, but was unfortunately the breeding ground of a rare tortoise. So the people of the Chagos, descendents of escaped slaves and Indian Ocean traders who'd lived on the island for several hundred years, were deemed 'transients', and shipped wholesale to various British possessions in the general vicinity.

The turtles were more important than the people.

And a British Court today just nailed the coffin shut: these people are forever forbidden from going home, or even visiting the graves of the ancestors.

I made a comment the other day about 'law' being entirely different than 'justice'. This illustrates that point perfectly.

A group of people exiled from the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia fail in their bid to return to their homeland.

(link) [BBC News | World | UK Edition]

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