LONDON (AP) — Bernadette Dugasse was just a toddler when her family was forced to leave her birthplace. She didn’t get a chance to return until she was a grandmother.
Dugasse, 68, has spent most of her life in the Seychelles and the U.K., wondering what it would be like to set foot on the tropical island of Diego Garcia, part of the remote cluster of atolls in the middle of the Indian Ocean called the Chagos Islands.
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Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows photos of a church in the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse pauses, during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse looks at a Chagos Islands map during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows sand and sea shells from the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows photos of the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse speaks, during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse looks at a Chagos Islands map during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Like hundreds of others native to the islands, Dugasse was kicked out of her homeland more than half a century ago when the British and U.S. governments decided to build an important military base there.
After years of fighting for the right to go home, Dugasse and other displaced islanders watched in despair Thursday as the U.K. government announced it was formally transferring the Chagos Islands’ sovereignty to Mauritius.
While political leaders spoke about international security and geopolitics, the deal meant only one thing for Chagossians: That the prospect of ever going back to live in their homeland now seems more out of reach than ever.
“We are the natives. We belong there,” said Dugasse, who has reluctantly settled in Crawley, a town south of London. “It made me feel enraged because I want to go home.”
Dugasse was born on the Chagos Islands, which had been under the administration of Mauritius, a former British colony, until 1965, when Britain split them away from Mauritius.
Mauritius gained independence in 1968, but the Chagos remained under British control and were named the British Indian Ocean Territory.
Dugasse was barely 2 years old when her family was deported to the Seychelles in 1958 after her father, a laborer, allegedly broke a work contract. They were never allowed back. Throughout the 1960s, many other islanders who thought they were leaving temporarily – for a holiday, or medical treatment -- would be told they cannot return to the Chagos.
It turned out that Britain was evicting the entire population of the Chago Islands -- about 1,500 people descended from African slaves and plantation workers –- so the U.S. military could build a base on the largest island, Diego Garcia.
By 1973, all Indigenous Chagossians were forced to leave. Thousands of islanders and their descendants are now spread around the world, most living in Mauritius, the U.K. and Seychelles. Most want to return home.
Britain’s government has acknowledged that its removal of islanders was wrong, and has granted many citizenship and set aside some funds to improve their lives. But it continues to bar Chagossians from returning and living in their homeland, citing defense and security concerns and “cost to the British taxpayer.”
Although the British government this week finalized a deal to transfer sovereignty of the Chagos to Mauritius, ending a long contested colonial legacy, there is no upside for Chagossians.
Dugasse and other islanders say they were completely excluded from political negotiations, and that Mauritius’ government is unlikely to grant them any right to return. Under the deal, which still needs Parliament's approval, Britain will lease back the Diego Garcia military base for at least 99 years. That means the island will be off-limits for the foreseeable feature.
“I don’t have a Mauritian passport. I don’t want to affiliate myself with Mauritius,” she said. “We have our own culture. We have our own identity. We are unique Indigenous people.”
Dugasse and another Diego Garcia native, Bertrice Pompe, sought to bring legal action against the British government over the deal to transfer the Chagos Islands to Mauritian control. They only managed to halt the signing of the deal by a few hours Thursday.
Pompe said it was a “very sad day” but she wasn’t giving up.
“The rights we’re asking for now, we’ve been fighting for for 60 years,” Pompe said outside a London courthouse. “Mauritius is not going to give that to us. So we need to keep fighting with the British government to listen to us.”
Human Rights Watch and other groups have urged Britain’s government to recognize the Chagossians’ right to return home, calling its failure to do so a “continuing colonial crime against humanity."
Dugasse — who received British citizenship but said she got no other compensation — has been allowed back to Diego Garcia just twice in recent years. Both times the visits were only possible with special permission from the U.K. government.
She described the island as a “mini-America,” populated by American service members and Filipino staffers. She visited the church where her parents were married and where she was baptized, but found her village cemetery and school in ruins.
And when she collected seashells and white sand from the beach, officials told her she wasn’t allowed to bring those home.
“I told them no — (the shells and the sand) are mine, not yours,” she said. “We were allowed there for only nine days, and every day I cried.”
Dugasse said her elderly mother, who lives in the Seychelles, would like to die on Diego Garcia. She doesn't think that's possible — and she is pessimistic that any of her children or grandchildren will get a chance to see where their family came from.
“Are we Chagossians always going to be nomads, going from place to place?" she asked. "Most of the natives are dying. What will happen? It’s time for us to set foot home.”
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows photos of a church in the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse pauses, during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse looks at a Chagos Islands map during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows sand and sea shells from the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse shows photos of the Chagos Islands during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse speaks, during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
Chagossian Bernadette Dugasse looks at a Chagos Islands map during an interview with The Associated Press, at her home in London, Tuesday, March 25, 2025. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
