Nigel Farage meets Trump at Mar-a-Lago over Chagos deal
UK pays Mauritius to lease Diego Garcia after ceding sovereignty, opposition seeks leverage through Washington rather than Westminster
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Donald Trump has branded the deal an act of ‘great stupidity’. Nigel Farage says it is the ‘worst deal in history’ (The White House)
The White House
US president Donald Trump initially supported the deal before performing a major U-turn (CPA Media Pte Ltd/Alamy/PA)
CPA Media Pte Ltd/Alamy/PA
Nigel Farage travelled to Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate to press his case against Keir Starmer’s agreement to hand sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius while leasing back Diego Garcia, the UK-US military base. The Independent reports Farage said he would “reinforce the message” over dinner after Trump publicly criticised the deal as “great stupidity” following earlier signs of support.
The numbers in the treaty do most of the talking. Under the plan, Britain would pay Mauritius at least £120 million a year for 99 years — a cash total the paper puts at £35 billion — to keep operating on Diego Garcia after ceding the British Indian Ocean Territory. For Starmer’s government, the pitch is continuity: secure the base by settling a sovereignty dispute. For Farage, the pitch is betrayal: he calls it a “surrender” treaty and frames it as a test of whether Britain can hold territory without paying rent.
Farage’s tactic is the more revealing part. Rather than fight the treaty solely through Parliament and British public opinion, he is trying to use an American political veto point as leverage over a British decision. Trump does not vote in Westminster, but the UK’s claim that the deal is necessary to “secure the future” of a joint base makes Washington’s view decisive in practice. When a British opposition leader seeks to shape that view in Florida, it underlines what the arrangement already implies: the UK is negotiating not just with Mauritius but with the US security establishment and, increasingly, with whoever controls the Republican microphone.
Mauritius, meanwhile, is signalling a different kind of pressure. The Independent reports Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam has spoken of exploring legal action over the delay in ratification. London’s response is that there is no clear basis in international law for compensation if the treaty stalls. That leaves the UK facing two risks at once: a diplomatic dispute with Mauritius if it backs away, and a domestic political fight if it proceeds with a price tag that looks like an annuity.
The timing is awkward. The same report notes Starmer has not spoken to Trump since a public dispute over the use of British bases in the Iran campaign, with Trump criticising the UK’s stance and mocking Starmer as “not Winston Churchill.” In that setting, the Chagos treaty becomes a convenient proxy battle: a sovereignty argument that can be settled by whether the White House signals approval.
Farage says the deal is “more than winnable.” The base on Diego Garcia is still there, and so is the annual invoice.