The United Kingdom said it has paused indefinitely an agreement that would transfer sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, after the Trump administration withdrew its support for the deal, leaving Britain unable to complete parliamentary ratification before the current session ends.
In a statement acknowledged Saturday, the government said the legislation required to approve the transfer agreement had “run out of time in Parliament,” and that it now expects it will not be included in bills announced when King Charles III opens the next session starting May 13. Britain tied the pause directly to the shift in U.S. backing that came after Donald Trump reversed course in January, calling the transfer proposal “an act of GREAT STUPIDITY” in a social media post.
The Chagos Islands are home to the Diego Garcia base, a joint U.K.-U.S. strategic site that Britain and Washington rely on for military operations. Britain’s government said the deal was designed around that long-term security need, adding that it would only proceed if it had U.S. support and that it is continuing to engage with the United States and Mauritius.
In the British government’s view, keeping the Diego Garcia base operational is the “entire reason for the deal,” with officials saying “ensuring its long-term operational security is and will continue to be our priority.” The pause comes as Britain’s broader relationship with the Trump administration has soured under Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government, according to the Associated Press account.
Simon McDonald, described as the former head of Britain’s Foreign Office until 2020, told the BBC that the government “had no other choice” but to freeze the agreement. He said the administration had to respond to a situation in which, in his words, the president of the United States was “openly hostile,” describing the treaty as going into a “deep freeze for the time being.”
The islands at issue form a remote chain of more than 60 islands in the Indian Ocean, south of the Maldives and off the tip of India. The Chagos chain has been under British control since 1814, and Diego Garcia has hosted a military base that has supported U.S. operations from Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as serving as a bombers base for U.S. operations in the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran.
Under the agreement reached with Mauritius after years of negotiation, Britain would lease back the Diego Garcia base for at least 99 years. Starmer’s government said the deal protects the base from international legal challenge, and it has pointed to years of pressure from the United Nations and its top court urging Britain to return the islands to Mauritius.
The agreement has also faced political resistance in Britain. The opposition Conservative Party and Reform U.K. opposed the transfer, saying giving up the islands could put them at risk of interference by China and Russia, and they pushed the Trump administration to rescind its support for the deal.
Chagossians displaced from Diego Garcia in the 1960s and 1970s have said they were not consulted about the arrangement and that the agreement would make it harder for them to go home. An estimated 10,000 displaced Chagossians and their descendants live mainly in Britain, Mauritius and the Seychelles, and some have pursued court challenges in the U.K. for years seeking the right to return.