There seems to be significant faux outrage from Tory leadership candidates Cleverly and Tugendhat about the Starmer governmentβs transfer of the Chagos islands to Mauritius.
Official sources tell me the transfer would have happened in materially the same
way at roughly the same time if Sunak had somehow won the election.
The point is that the transfer was being negotiated on the recent Tory governmentβs watch - including by Cleverly as foreign secretary and then by Cameron - and the deadline was in effect set by Washington.
I am told that President Biden wanted the deal done before the 5 November presidential election. Biden wanted certainty about the future of the US military base on the Chagossian island of Diego Garcia, just in case Donald Trump were to win the election.
For confirmation that the deal was clinched on a timetable and in a style to suit the US administration, see Bidenβs statement that βit is a clear demonstration that through diplomacy and partnership, countries can overcome longstanding historical challenges to reach peaceful and mutually beneficial outcomesβ.
Biden pointed out that the agreement between the UK and Mauritius meant the US had secured βthe effective operation of the joint [military] facility on Diego Garcia into the next century.β
It is therefore curious Tugendhat should describe the transfer as βleaving our alliesβ exposed when the UKβs most important ally, America, has welcomed it.
And Cleverlyβs denigration of Starmer as βweak, weak, weakβ for formalising it seems eccentric when the negotiations with Mauritius were in full swing when he was in the cabinet.
As for Liz Trussβs assertion that Boris Johnson is to blame, I am told that Johnson was the last PM to wholly oppose giving up sovereignty over Chagos, and that the talks did not start properly till she was PM.
If anyone in the Tory party wants to know the nitty gritty of all this, possibly they could ask for an introduction from the former minister Lord Frost - because his spouse Harriet Matthews has been the lead official negotiator for the foreign office on the Chagos treaty with Mauritius.