Donald Trump’s incoming administration in the United States has “very deep disquiet” over the UK’s plans to give up sovereignty of the Diego Garcia military base, Nigel Farage warned.
The Reform UK leader issued the warning after visiting Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort this week for talks with Elon Musk and other allies of the president-elect.
Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty said the “national security apparatus” in the US backed the plan to deal with the issue of sovereignty over the Chagos Islands by handing sovereignty to Mauritius and leasing back the strategically important UK-US military base on Diego Garcia.
The Government has argued that a deal to hand over the islands, known as the British Indian Ocean Territory, is necessary following an International Court of Justice ruling.
Ministers have insisted the provisions for a 99-year lease on the Diego Garcia base address legal uncertainty around the facility.
But the proposed deal was struck before elections in both Mauritius and the US and has run into trouble since the results of those contests.
New Mauritian prime minister Navin Ramgoolam said the draft deal “would not produce the benefits that the nation could expect” and negotiations had restarted.
Mr Farage told the Commons: “I’ve just returned hot foot from a very full Mar-a-Lago, and I have spoken to several members, senior administrators especially, of the incoming administration who will be in the White House in 32 days time.
“Let me assure you, there is very deep disquiet amongst all of them as to what this may mean for the long-term future of Diego Garcia and whether such deal would hold, given the precedent of the deal break over Hong Kong.
“They also can’t understand why we would surrender the sovereignty of these islands on an advisory judgment for a pretty obscure court.”
He suggested the terms of the deal should be put to a referendum of exiled Chagossians.
Mr Doughty said the rules in the US meant contacts with the incoming administration in the transition period were limited, but he was “confident” that when Mr Trump and his team saw the full details of the deal they would back it.
He said: “We are… confident that when the full details of this deal are provided by, indeed, the US national security apparatus that any concerns will be allayed.”
Mr Doughty was forced to come to the Commons to respond to an urgent question from shadow foreign secretary Dame Priti Patel after Mr Ramgoolam told the national assembly in Mauritius he had rejected the terms of the draft deal.
Mr Ramgoolam’s government and the UK have exchanged counter-proposals since the original deal was rejected.
Dame Priti said: “When the whole world can see that this proposed deal was falling apart, the Foreign Secretary and this Government have tried to flog it constantly.
“Not only is this a monumental failure of statecraft from this Labour Government, it is also a significant humiliation for the Foreign Secretary and his credibility and the Prime Minister, and why are Labour putting the security at risk, ignoring Chagossians and letting our standing go into freefall in this world?”
Mr Doughty told MPs that Mr Ramgoolam had reiterated “his willingness to conclude a deal with the UK” and it was “completely understandable that the new Mauritian government will want time to study the details”.
“I am confident that we have agreed a good and fair deal that is in both sides’ interests,” he said.
“It protects the base at proportionate cost. It has been supported across the national security architecture in the United States and by India.”
Mr Ramgoolam told his country’s parliament on Tuesday that Mauritius had “made clear that while it is still willing to conclude an agreement with the United Kingdom, the draft agreement which was shown to us after the general elections is one which, in our view, would not produce the benefits that the nation could expect from such an agreement”.
