Chagos islanders tell Donald Trump they could name an ISLAND after him if he blocks Labour's £30 billion giveaway to Mauritius
The islanders' First Minister Misley Mandarin warns that the 'very bad deal' would 'put at risk' the strategically important UK-US military base on the island of Diego Garcia.
By JASON GROVES, POLITICAL EDITOR
Published: 18:05 GMT, 9 January 2026 | Updated: 13:07 GMT, 11 January 2026
Chagos islanders have made a last-ditch appeal to Donald Trump to veto Labour’s £30billion plan to hand the vital archipelago to Mauritius.
In a letter to the US President, the islanders’ First Minister Misley Mandarin warns that the ‘very bad deal’ would ‘put at risk’ the strategically important UK-US military base on the island of Diego Garcia.
Mr Mandarin warns that the deal brokered by Keir Starmer’s controversial National Security Adviser Jonathan Powell, could give China ‘leverage’ over the base which is seen as a critical military asset in the Indian Ocean.
Mauritius, he says ‘would hold sovereignty over every inch of the US base’.
Mr Mandarin suggests that grateful Chagossians might even be prepared to name an island after President Trump to ‘mark the moment America chose strength, fairness and long-term security over a short-term fix’.
The letter, which is due to be delivered to the White House this weekend, comes ahead of a critical vote in Parliament on Monday on the treaty which would hand the islands to Mauritius.
Ministers insist that the deal is needed to secure the future of the base following a long-running sovereignty dispute. They have agreed to hand Mauritius payments totalling around £30billion in return for a 99-year lease on Diego Garcia, which the UK currently has sovereignty over.
The deal would also end the prospect of the Chagossian people returning to the islands they were forced to leave in the late 1960s to allow for the construction of the military base.
Diego Garcia: Home to a critical UK-US military base that is said to be coveted by China
Misley Mandarin, First Minister of the Chagossian government-in-exile has told President Trump that blocking the deal would 'shut the door on Chinese interference'
Islanders have suggested that one of the remote archipelago's 60 islands could be named after Donald Trump if he intervenes to block Labour's deal
The White House has previously indicated it is content to let the deal go through. But critics believe President Trump has never been given the full picture of the risk it would pose to US operations in the Indian Ocean.
Mr Mandarin says that pausing the deal would mean ‘a just and secure solution becomes possible’, in which the Chagossians might one day be able to return home.