LONDON (AP) — The governments of Britain and Mauritius signed a deal to settle the future of the Chagos Islands, the contested archipelago in the middle of the Indian Ocean, after overcoming last-minute legal hurdles Thursday.
The deal will transfer sovereignty of the Chagos Islands from the U.K. to Mauritius — though Britain will retain control of the largest of the chain of islands, Diego Garcia, which hosts a strategically important American naval and bomber base.
The two countries reached an initial agreement in October, but it was put on hold after Britain said it had to wait for the approval of U.S. President Donald Trump. The deal also became stuck after a change of government in Mauritius, amid quarrels over how much money the U.K. should pay for the lease of Diego Garcia. The U.S. pays Britain an unspecified amount to operate the base.
Here's what to know about the disputed islands.
The remote chain of more than 60 islands is located in the middle of the Indian Ocean off the tip of India, south of the Maldives.
The Chagos Islands have been under British control since 1814, when they were ceded by France.
The archipelago is best known for the military base on Diego Garcia, which has supported U.S. military operations from Vietnam to Iraq and Afghanistan. In 2008, the U.S. acknowledged it also had been used for clandestine rendition flights of terror suspects.
Britain split the Chagos Islands away from Mauritius, a former British colony, in 1965, three years before Mauritius gained independence, and called the Chagos archipelago the British Indian Ocean Territory.
The U.S. has described the base, which is home to about 2,500 mostly American personnel, as “an all but indispensable platform” for security operations in the Middle East, South Asia and East Africa.
Most recently, the U.S. deployed several nuclear-capable B-2 Spirit bombers to Diego Garcia amid an intense airstrike campaign targeting Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
In the 1960s and 1970s Britain evicted as many as 2,000 people from the islands so the U.S. military could build the Diego Garcia base.
In recent years criticism grew over Britain's control of the archipelago and the way it forcibly displaced the local population.
The United Nations and the International Court of Justice have both urged Britain to end its “colonial administration” of the islands and transfer their sovereignty to Mauritius.
Negotiations on handing the islands to Mauritius began in 2022 under the U.K.'s previous Conservative government and resumed after Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labour Party was elected in July.
In October Britain's government announced that it was finalizing details of a treaty to hand sovereignty of the islands to Mauritius, with the exception of Diego Garcia, which will remain under British control.
The deal was hailed by then-U.S. President Joe Biden as a “historic agreement” that secured the future of the Diego Garcia base. But Britain's opposition Conservatives slammed the government for surrendering control of the territory, saying that the decision exposed the U.K. and its allies to security threats. Last year the now-Secretary of State Marco Rubio also said it posed “a serious threat” to U.S. national security.
In the beginning of this year Britain’s government confirmed that the Trump administration was reviewing a renegotiated deal. In February, Trump suggested he was in favor of the agreement when he met Starmer in Washington.
Meanwhile voters in Mauritius ousted the government that made the deal, and new Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam backed away from it, citing financial concerns.
Ramgoolam suggested that the initial deal — which would reportedly see the U.K. pay 90 million pounds ($116 million) a year to Mauritius for the continued operation of the Diego Garcia military base — was a “sellout."
The U.K. government said Thursday a final deal was signed after a court injunction stopping the handover was lifted. Officials said Britain will pay Mauritius 101 million pounds ($136 million) per year to lease back the base for at least 99 years.
The deal must be approved by Britain's Parliament.
An estimated 10,000 displaced Chagossians and their descendants now live primarily in Britain, Mauritius and the Seychelles. Many of them want to return to the islands, and some have fought unsuccessfully in U.K. courts for many years for the right to go home.
Chagossians say they were left out of the political negotiations, which have left them unclear on whether they and their descendants could ever be allowed to return to their homeland.
Human Rights Watch has said that Britain's forced displacement of the Chagossians and ongoing refusal to let them go home “amount to crimes against humanity committed by a colonial power against an Indigenous people.”
Two Chagossian women, Bernadette Dugasse and Bertrice Pompe, who challenged the handover deal in the British courts, argued it will become even harder to return once Mauritius takes control of the islands.
The draft deal stated a resettlement fund would be created for displaced islanders to help them move back to the islands, apart from Diego Garcia. But details of how that will work remain sketchy.
FILE - This image realeased by the U.S. Navy shows an aerial view of Diego Garcia. (U.S. Navy via AP, File)
People demonstrate outside the High Court in London, Thursday, May 22, 2025, after a British court blocked the U.K. from transferring sovereignty over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius hours before the agreement was due to be signed. (AP Photo/Thomas Krych)
The U.N. Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting Thursday to discuss Iran's deadly protests at the request of the United States, even as President Donald Trump left unclear what actions he would take against the Islamic state.
Tehran appeared to make conciliatory statements in an effort to defuse the situation after Trump threatened to take action to stop further killing of protesters, including the execution of anyone detained in Tehran’s bloody crackdown on nationwide protests.
Iran’s crackdown on the demonstrations has killed at least 2,615, the U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency reported. The death toll exceeds any other round of protest or unrest in Iran in decades and recalls the chaos surrounding the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Iran closed its airspace to commercial flights for hours without explanation early Thursday and some personnel at a key U.S. military base in Qatar were advised to evacuate. The U.S. Embassy in Kuwait also ordered its personnel to “temporary halt” travel to the multiple military bases in the small Gulf Arab country.
Iran previously closed its airspace during the 12-day war against Israel in June.
Here is the latest:
China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi has spoken with his counterpart in Iran, who said the situation was “now stable,” China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
Abbas Araghchi said “he hoped China will play a greater role in regional peace and stability” during the talks, according to the statement from the ministry.
“China opposes imposing its will on other countries, and opposes a return to the ‘law of the jungle’,” Wang said.
“China believes that the Iranian government and people will unite, overcome difficulties, maintain national stability, and safeguard their legitimate rights and interests,” he added. “China hopes all parties will cherish peace, exercise restraint, and resolve differences through dialogue. China is willing to play a constructive role in this regard.”
“We are against military intervention in Iran,” Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told journalists in Istanbul on Thursday. “Iran must address its own internal problems… They must address their problems with the region and in global terms through diplomacy so that certain structural problems that cause economic problems can be addressed.”
Ankara and Tehran enjoy warm relations despite often holding divergent interests in the region.
Fidan said the unrest in Iran was rooted in economic conditions caused by sanctions, rather than ideological opposition to the government.
Iranians have been largely absent from an annual pilgrimage to Baghdad, Iraq, to commemorate the death of Imam Musa al-Kadhim, one of the twelve Shiite imams.
Many Iranian pilgrims typically make the journey every year for the annual religious rituals.
Streets across Baghdad were crowded with pilgrims Thursday. Most had arrived on foot from central and southern provinces of Iraq, heading toward the shrine of Imam al-Kadhim in the Kadhimiya district in northern Baghdad,
Adel Zaidan, who owns a hotel near the shrine, said the number of Iranian visitors this year compared to previous years was very small. Other residents agreed.
“This visit is different from previous ones. It lacks the large numbers of Iranian pilgrims, especially in terms of providing food and accommodation,” said Haider Al-Obaidi.
Europe’s largest airline group said Thursday it would halt night flights to and from Tel Aviv and Jordan's capital Amman for five days, citing security concerns as fears grow that unrest in Iran could spiral into wider regional violence.
Lufthansa — which operates Swiss, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines and Eurowings — said flights would run only during daytime hours from Thursday through Monday “due to the current situation in the Middle East.” It said the change would ensure its staff — which includes unionized cabin crews and pilots -- would not be required to stay overnight in the region.
The airline group also said its planes would bypass Iranian and Iraqi airspace, key corridors for air travel between the Middle East and Asia.
Iran closed its airspace to commercial flights for several hours early Thursday without explanation.
A spokesperson for Israel’s Airport Authority, which oversees Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport, said the airport was operating as usual.
Iranian state media has denied claims that a young man arrested during Iran’s recent protests was condemned to death. The statement from Iran’s judicial authorities on Thursday contradicted what it said were “opposition media abroad” which claimed the young man had been quickly sentenced to death during a violent crackdown on anti-government protests in the country.
State television didn’t immediately give any details beyond his name, Erfan Soltani. Iranian judicial authorities said Soltani was being held in a detention facility outside of the capital. Alongside other protesters, he has been accused of “propaganda activities against the regime,” state media said.
New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Winston Peters said Thursday that his government was “appalled by the escalation of violence and repression” in Iran.
“We condemn the brutal crackdown being carried out by Iran’s security forces, including the killing of protesters,” Peters posted on X.
“Iranians have the right to peaceful protest, freedom of expression, and access to information – and that right is currently being brutally repressed,” he said.
Peters said his government had expressed serious concerns to the Iranian Embassy in Wellington.
A demonstrator lights a cigarette with a burning poster depicting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a rally in support of Iran's anti-government protests, in Holon, Israel, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
Protesters participate in a demonstration in support of the nationwide mass protests in Iran against the government, in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Protesters participate in a demonstration in support of the nationwide mass protests in Iran against the government, in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
