Photo: Gallo Images/Getty Images. Retrieved from theguardian.com
Britain’s foreign secretary, David Cameron, has provoked fury by abruptly ruling out the resettlement of former inhabitants of the Chagos Islands, months after his predecessor revealed that the UK was discussing their potential return.
The former prime minister suggested that a return to the islands was now “not possible” for Chagossians who were forcibly displaced by the British government in the 1960s and 1970s.
His stance stunned islanders who a year ago had celebrated the news that the UK was discussing the return of islanders along with a possible future handover of the Chagos archipelago.
On Thursday, Human Rights Watch (HRW) wrote to Cameron expressing its “extreme concern” over the apparent U-turn after a long-running campaign to repatriate Chagos islanders.