Donald Trump has backed the UK’s deal to hand over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius after holding ‘very productive’ discussions with Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
The US President described the proposed agreement as the ‘best’ Starmer could make, seemingly signalling a change in support after criticising it last month.
The deal would transfer sovereignty of the Indian Ocean islands to Mauritius, while maintaining control of the Diego Garcia base on a lease agreement for 99 years at a cost of $47 (£35) million.
‘I have had very productive discussions with Prime Minister Keir Starmer about the Island of Diego Garcia,‘ Trump wrote on Truth Social on Thursday.
I understand that the deal Prime Minister Starmer has made, according to many, the best he could make,’ he added, before warning the US could ‘militarily secure’ the base if the lease agreement ‘ever falls apart’.
Mr Trump tore into the deal just a few weeks ago, warning the agreement was an ‘act of great stupidity’, an ‘act of total weakness’ and claimed the site of the Diego Garcia base was being given away ‘for no reason whatsoever’.
The President argued that giving away the islands was an act of surrender and warned the territory could fall into the hands of China, an ally of Mauritius.
Starmer accused the US of changing stance as a pressure tactic in Trump’s bid to seize Greenland from Nato ally Denmark.
President Donald Trump speaks during the 74th annual National Prayer Breakfast at the Washington Hilton on February 5
Trump talks with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the White House in August
Britain struck a deal to transfer sovereignty of the Indian Ocean islands to Mauritius, while maintaining control of the Diego Garcia base on a lease agreementfor 99 years at a cost of $47 (£35) million
The White House has since retreated from threats over the Arctic island, after a backlash from other Western powers.
Starmer had appeared to avoid raising the issue directly with Trump until a phone call at the beginning of this week.
A Downing Street readout of that call showed the PM and President agreed to ‘continue working closely’ to secure the future of the Diego Garcia base.
Downing Street has insisted the case for the Chagos Islands deal is ‘crystal clear’ after Lord Mandelson claimed there had been a ‘wobble’ over it within the Government.
The former US ambassador, who was forced to resign in September over links to pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein, revealed the private concerns in an interview with the Times.
He said he ‘became aware of a serious wobble in London over the agreement and its sell-ability to the British public’.
‘That was to do with the price tag and whether we had the total legal obligation to enter the deal and whether the original legal case made for the agreement in Whitehall was as watertight as was claimed,’ the peer said.
‘So on the one hand I faced a skeptical US administration and then at another point a wobbly government of my own behind me.’
