[A-List] UK sub-imperialism: Diego Garcia

[Michael Keaney]

Judge rejects islanders' lawsuit over military base at Diego Garcia
By Robert Verkaik Legal Affairs Correspondent
The Independent, 10 October 2003

Thousands of destitute Indian Ocean islanders claiming compensation for
being evicted from their homes by the British Government more than 30 years
ago were branded "liars" by a High Court judge yesterday when he threw out
their legal action.

Mr Justice Ouseley, sitting in the High Court in London, ruled that there
were no reasonable grounds for bringing their action, including their claim
for a declaration that they had a right to return home to the Chagos
Islands.

The judge acknowledged that some of the islanders had been "treated
shamefully" when the British evicted them from their archipelago to pave the
way for an American military base on Diego Garcia at the height of the Cold
War.

But he said that their legal claims for compensation for personal injury
suffered during their eviction and resettlement in Mauritius and Seychelles
in the 1960s and 1970s were stale and were now time-barred.

In a stinging criticism of their legal action the judge said that "some of
the Chagossian witnesses gave deliberately false evidence on a number of
issues". He added: "Evidence was also given, as if at first hand, about
events which the witness could not have seen or heard."

In particular, the judge said, some of the islanders had failed to address
the question of a past litigation that culminated in 1,344 Chagossians
benefiting from a £4m settlement with the British Government in 1982.

Representatives of the 5,000 islanders who were in court yesterday to hear
the ruling vowed to continue their fight for justice. Speaking during a
break in the summary, Richard Gifford, acting on behalf of the islanders,
said: "They will certainly continue their struggle. They are now in a state
of shock that there has been no adjudication in their favour." He added
that, although "there is not much that is pleasurable in the judgment", the
judge had at least "recognised the sufferings they have gone through".

Mr Justice Ouseley ruled that there were no reasonable grounds for bringing
the claim and that it had no real prospect of success. He awarded summary
judgment to the Attorney General, on behalf of the Government and Her
Majesty's British Indian Ocean Territory Commissioner.

The case followed a ruling in November 2000 in which two judges said that
there was "no source of lawful authority" to justify the way that the
inhabitants of the Chagos Islands were removed from their homes. But Mr
Justice Ouseley said that their claim of unlawful exile as a legal wrong was
not arguable.

He said: "Justice does not require an obviously unmeritorious case to be
allowed to proceed. Ill-treatment does not require a hopeless case to be
allowed to continue. Indeed, to raise false hopes would not be fair.

"There is every good reason to avoid the waste of public money and court
resources which the continuation of hopeless claims or contentions would
otherwise create." He added that he was "acutely conscious" of the position
of at least some of the claimants.

"It does appear that, in the absence of unexpectedly compelling evidence to
the contrary, at least some claimant Chagossians could show that they were
treated shamefully by successive UK governments."

Whatever view might be taken of the strategic importance of Diego Garcia,
some people were uprooted from the only way of life they knew and were sent
to places where there was little or no provision for their reception,
accommodation, employment and well-being, he said.