International

UK halts Chagos Island transfer after US withdraws support

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by Ryan Mancini - 04/11/26 3:32 PM ET

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by Ryan Mancini - 04/11/26 3:32 PM ET

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The United Kingdom on Saturday paused its transfer of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius after President Trump recently withdrew his cooperation for the 2024 agreement.

The U.K. and the U.S. have shared a military base on Diego Garcia, the largest island in the Chagos, since the 1970s. The agreement to transfer the islands to Mauritius, which would allow for continued use of the base, stemmed from a decades-long legal battle to address Britain’s colonial past.

The British government on Saturday said it is permanently abandoning the agreement with Mauritius, stating that it cannot go forward with the transfer without U.S. support.

But the government noted that ensuring the Diego Garcia base’s “long-term operational security is and will continue to be our priority –– it is the entire reason for the deal,” according to an official statement.

“We are continuing to engage with the U.S. and Mauritius,” the British government stated.

The transfer had been in jeopardy since Trump blasted the deal earlier this year. He called it a “great act of stupidity” in January, followed by his plea that the British government “DO NOT GIVE AWAY DIEGO GARCIA!” in a Truth Social post in February.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer hit back at Trump in January, saying the president’s “words on Chagos yesterday that were different to his previous words of welcome and support when I met him in the White House.”

Trump then focused some of rhetorical attacks toward Starmer in the lead-up to the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran, which began Feb. 28.

The president warned that if the U.S. and Iran didn’t come to an agreement for Iran to halt its nuclear program, “it may be necessary for the United States to use Diego Garcia, and the Airfield located in Fairford [England], in order to eradicate a potential attack by a highly unstable and dangerous Regime,” he wrote on Truth Social on Feb. 18.

The State Department, however, announced that same day that it supported the U.K. deal to transfer the islands’ sovereignty to Mauritius.

Starmer criticized the conflict with Iran, initially pausing the U.S.’s use of British bases for U.S. forces deployed for “Operation Epic Fury.” Trump disparaged Starmer and other NATO allies reluctant to join the conflict, saying last month that Starmer was “not Winston Churchill.”

“Well, it’s a very late response, the U.K.,” Trump told The Hill last month after Starmer reversed his decision. “I was surprised because the relationship is so good. But this has never happened before.”

“They were really pretty much our first ally. … They didn’t want us to use the island — the so-called island — which for some reason they gave up rights to it,” he added, referring to Diego Garcia and the Chagos Islands transfer.

The conflict has caused higher prices on trade goods and oil exports in the U.K., prompting Starmer to slam Trump over energy prices and drawing a parallel between him and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“I’m fed up with the fact that families across the country see their bills go up and down on energy, businesses’ bills go up and down on energy, because of the actions of Putin or Trump across the world,” he told ITV News’s Robert Peston on Thursday.

The Associated Press contributed.

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