Keir Starmer’s surrender of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius WILL jeopardise the ‘special relationship’ between the UK and US, one of Donald Trump’s top aides warns_Nhy
Surrending the Chagos Islands to Mauritius will jeopardise the ‘special relationship’ between the UK and US, one of Donald Trump’s top aides has warned.
Robert Wilkie, who is heading up the President’s transition team in the Pentagon, branded Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to cede the islands as ‘haphazard’.
His comments are a blow to No 10, which has been hoping for a cordial start to the Trump administration and has rowed back on past criticisms of the President.
‘I think it was a calamitous decision, I don’t think there was much thought put into it,’ Mr Wilkie told the BBC yesterday.
In Mr Trump’s mind, he warned, the move was ‘something that could impinge on that special relationship’ between the two nations.
Labour has sparked fury by deciding to cede the islands, which Britain has controlled since 1814, to Mauritius.
Mr Wilkie said the Diego Garcia military base, on the largest of the Islands, provides ‘leverage to project power’.
A Foreign Office spokesman said: ‘Given Diego Garcia’s status as a key strategic asset, it is right to discuss the agreement with the new US administration.’
Meanwhile, Sir Keir was last night still angling to be one of the first world leaders to meet Mr Trump following his inauguration but a meeting had yet to be confirmed.
Labour made the shock announcement in October that it was going to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands, which has been a British overseas territory for more than 200 years. (pictured: Keir Starmer)
Robert Wilkie, who is heading up the President’s transition team in the Pentagon, branded Sir Keir Starmer’s decision to cede the islands as ‘haphazard’
Chagossians were forced to leave the central Indian Ocean territory by 1973 to make way for the military base (pictured: Diego Garcia, the largest island in the Chagos)
In Mr Trump’s mind (pictured), the move was ‘something that could impinge on that special relationship’ between the two nations, Mr Wilkie warned
The British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) or Chagos Islands (formerly the Oil Islands) is an overseas territory of the United Kingdom situated in the Indian Ocean, halfway between Africa and Indonesia
No10 yesterday also declined to comment on Mr Trump’s controversial first acts in office.
Confidence is fading among UK Government figures that a deal will be secured before Monday, according to the Financial Times.
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman refused to ‘give a running commentary on every executive order or decision made by President Trump and his administration’.
Downing Street had been asked to comment on Mr Trump’s executive orders to leave the World Health Organization (WHO) and withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.
It comes amid concerns about a political gulf between Labour and the new White House – with suggestions that the nomination of Lord Mandelson as the UK’s ambassador could be vetoed.
Lord Mandelson’s perceived links to China, and concerns about his pro-European views, are said to be to blame.
But senior No10 sources have rejected the claims and remain confident he will be given the post.
Meanwhile, it was reported yesterday that Mr Trump’s team are annoyed that details of a call between him and Sir Keir made it into UK newspapers earlier this month.
The then-president elect was said to have become ‘fixated on the number of birds dying after flying into wind turbines in the US’, and joked that ‘the coyotes eating the fallen birds were getting so fat’ that they ‘would need to be given weight-loss drugs’, the report in The Times said.
Yesterday the i Paper revealed that Mr Trump’s team were ‘particularly annoyed as the report gave the impression that Britain was laughing at the incoming president’.
It is highly unusual for details of such a high-level call to leak to the media.
There are also suggestions that Mr Trump could punish Sir Keir for party activists travelling to the US to campaign for his Democrat rival Kamala Harris.
The Mail on Sunday revealed at the weekend that some of Mr Trump’s key advisers were debating whether to put Sir Keir ‘at the back of the queue’ of world leaders invited to Washington.
One Trump ally warned that the PM was ‘gonna have to eat humble pie’ to get a speedy visit to the White House.
Mr Trump’s campaign filed a Federal Election Commission complaint against Labour in October, accusing it of ‘blatant foreign interference’ after the party’s head of operations, Sofia Patel, asked for people to travel to the US to campaign for Harris.
