The sovereignty dispute over the Chagos Archipelago, and Diego Garcia in particular, has reached a new level which requires India to reassess its approach.
The changing security dynamics of the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) and the involvement of three friendly nations (Mauritius, U.K., and the U.S.) in the dispute requires a more realist stance from India as its national interests could be impacted in time.
Diego Garcia, a twenty-four kilometres long island with an area of thirty square kilometres, is a small territory in the centre of the IOR, and yet has played a major role in power plays since the Cold War. The island hosts a U.S. base and is a part of the Chagos Archipelago, a British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), from which the United Kingdom draws its claim as an Indian Ocean (IO) nation.
Two issues emerge from the dispute that India has contended with over time. First, is the retention of the Chagos Archipelago as a part of the United Kingdom while granting independence to Mauritius in 1968 and the expulsion of the local population, the Chagossians, in 1971.
