dan hare

Code-free data and AI specialist, Links Golf addict

[dan hare @djhare]

Incredible this doesn't get more attention.
When the guardian started the stories about Chagos, it was all about the human rights of the evicted islanders, fair enough .
Once it was on the agenda they were never referenced by them again.

[Kel Mansfield @tedkel]

Why were Jonathan Powell, Peter Mandelson and Lord Hermer appointed without vetting?

The answer is that Chagos was a deal Starmer couldn't refuse to make.

Here's a timeline of the key stages of the Chagos treachery.

In 1982, after it became known that the Chagos seabed may contain vast mineral wealth, Mauritius set up a select committee to examine the matter.
However, sea-mining technology was in its infancy, and it was too expensive to be commercially viable at that time.

In 2003, as underwater mining technologies advanced and the value of minerals and rare earth elements soared, mining the Chagos seabed became an exciting possibility again; Mauritius appointed the eminent international barrister Sir Ian Brownlie as advisor for the Chagos Archipelago.

A former member of the Communist Party of Great Britain, Brownlie was a good friend of Sir Satcam Boolell, a former Labour deputy prime minister of Mauritius, and High Commissioner in London.

In 2009, Brownlie led the first Mauritius delegation to the Foreign Office in London seeking a Chagos deal.
Among the delegation was Sir Satcam Boolell's son Satyajit, who became Mauritius Director of Public Prosecutions the same year.

In 2010, after Brownlie died in a motor accident in Egypt, Sir Keir Starmer’s “great mate”, Philippe Sands, a leading human-rights lawyer who has publicly boasted of humiliating the UK in international courts, took over as counsel to Mauritius for Chagos.

In 2013, Satyajit Boolell invited Keir Starmer, whom he had become friendly with during Starmer's time as the UK's DPP, to a legal conference at the 5-star Balaclava resort in Mauritius.

During the trip, Starmer discussed the future of the Chagos Archipelago with then Mauritius prime minister Navin Ramgoolam.

After Starmer’s 2013 visit, Ramgoolam wrote that he and Starmer were aligned over Chagos.

In 2015, Ramgoolam was arrested on money-laundering charges when large sums of cash in foreign currencies, suitcases full of brand-new luxury watches, and blank British visas were found in his home.

Also in 2015, Starmer was elected to the British Parliament.

In 2019, Philippe Sands, after a campaign of lobbying the UN, obtained an International Court of Justice ruling (advisory opinion only, and non-binding) that the Chagos islands should be given to Mauritius.

Sands used the ICJ ruling as leverage in the following years in his efforts to persuade the Conservative government to give Chagos to Mauritius.

In 2020, Starmer became leader of the Labour Party.

In 2021, Sands received Mauritius' top honour, The Most Distinguished Order of the Star and Key of the Indian Ocean.

In 2022, Sands made an unauthorized entry into the Chagos Archipelago for a flag-raising ceremony. Sands tweets at the time, “It’s morning on Chagos, where the flag of Mauritius flies."

In 2023, Sands became a Mauritius citizen, but retains his British and French citizenships.

🧧In November 2023, David Cameron replaced James Cleverly as Foreign Secretary and, with the support of other senior Tories, stopped a Chagos deal saying, it’s not in the national interest, as reported in Hansard.

In July 2024, Starmer became UK Prime Minister and just ten weeks after entering Downing Street, he agreed a deal with Mauritius, despite there having been no mention of Chagos during the election campaign, and the Labour manifesto pledging to protect the BOT.

in November of 2024, Ramgoolam was elected Mauritius prime minister again after a snap general election, and took over from the incumbent PM, Pravind Jugnauth, to lead the Chagos negotiations with the UK.

In December 2024, after 14 years in the role, Philippe Sands steps down as Mauritius counsel for Chagos.

In January 2025, Attorney General Lord Hermer recused himself from signing off on the Chagos deal, and declined to say why.

In February 2025, Jugnauth was arrested on money-laundering charges after large sums of cash in foreign currencies and suitcases full of brand-new luxury watches were found in his home.

In May 2025, twelve years after discussing the future of Chagos in Mauritius, Starmer and Ramgoolam sat down in London to sign the treaty that transfers the archipelago's sovereignty to Mauritius.

The Fall Out.

The Chagos deal does🟥NOT secure the joint UK/US military base on Diego Garcia.

The deal operationally hobbles the base, and increases the dangers to the British and American military personnel, and the civilians who work there, and in the wider Central Indian Ocean region.

Diego Garcia's remoteness made it easy to defend in the past. This deal leaves the base horribly vulnerable to the growing threats posed by the new longer-range missiles, and more sophisticated and lethal drones.

When Keir Starmer, Lord Hermer and Vijay Rangarajan, the Director General at the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, made the deal it was fully understood that the outer islands of the Chagos Archipelago were by far the best locations to deploy early warning, and air-defense systems, to protect the main base from missile and drone attacks.
Yet they still decided to lease only Diego Garcia.

Andy Burnham, Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband, and Defense Minister Wes Streeting, know the deal increases the dangers to the lives of British service personnel, and our NATO allies personnel, in the strategically important Central Indian Ocean region.
To double down and push the deal with that knowledge is a shameful act of betrayal.

While the deal leaves Diego Garcia vulnerable to attack, it also renders the base itself ineffective and operationally hobbled.

Mauritius is a signatory of the Pelindaba African Weapon-Free Zone Treaty which bans all nuclear weapons from treaty members' territory.

Pelindaba gives each of the more the 40 countries who have signed it the right to inspect the facilities on Diego Garcia if they suspect nuclear arms are being stored there.

The UK's nuclear-armed Trident submarines will no longer be able to enter Chagos waters, or visit Diego Garcia which is the only island in the region which has suitable anchorage and facilities for maintenance and restocking provisions, etc.

The US's nuclear-armed submarines, ships, and planes will also be banned from Diego Garcia and the Chagos Archipelago's waters.

Mauritius gets complete sovereignty over everything, including control of the airspace above the Chagos Archipelago, which at 250,000 square miles is the same size as France.

The implications of controlling such a vast area of airspace in a strategically vital region are huge.

Mauritius has shown it will ban planes entering its current airspace when China asks.

The Chagos Deal does not ‘secure the base’. It methodically destroys every element required for operations. The text and annexes state it will:
❌Constrain future Ops and use of the base
❌Prevent the placing of sensors and other maritime installations
❌Require us to sight our foes on defence planning
❌Mean we’re unable to use our preferred contractors
❌See us lose of control over electromagnetic spectrum.

[dan hare @djhare]

@1968Tv St Trevor !
He and Keegan went out unbeaten at Espana 82 😞

[Liam Halligan @LiamHalligan]

The UK government has, since April, spent no less than £61 billion - that’s £61,000,000,000 - on debt interest payments.

That’s equivalent to our entire annual defence budget - on just half a year’s worth of debt service costs, not paying back a penny of our national debt.

For £61bn you could build 40 state-of-the-art hospitals.

Or employ 100,000 nurses for a decade

Or fund free-at-the-point-of-use social care, across the entire UK, for three years.

Watch this short “When The Facts Change” video for more on the UK’s soaring debt interest bill - the biggest national scandal our mainstream media continues to ignore.

[dan hare @djhare]

@DawsonsRightPeg @PolitlcsUK @MillardClothier @geraldratner might want to nip this rumour in the bud...

[dan hare @djhare]

@thesundaysport Council pensions will go up

[Alan Smith @AlanJLSmith]

Brutal chart.

France and UK vs. Communist countries at their peak.

UK public spending as % of GDP is currently above Romania, Venezuela and China.

And France is a lost cause.

(HM Treasury/Rand Research)

[dan hare @djhare]

@moving_charlie They know they won't get a cushy gig at a small business after their short stint in politics, they've never had a real job so are only useful to big corporations lobbying their mates.

[Merryn Somerset Webb @MerrynSW]

How can it have taken this long for them to grasp this. If you really want non intermittent non fossil fuel energy, this is the only answer.

[dan hare @djhare]

@1968Tv Great when teams were made up of home nations players

[Moving Home with Charlie @moving_charlie]

No comment required.

[Cut My Tax @CutMyTaxUK]

Laffer curve latest: big increases in the tax burden have reduced tax revenues as companies have been pushed into bankruptcy.

Business insolvencies rose 39% between 2019-20 and 2025-26 as higher taxes and soaring costs caused firms to collapse. HMRC lost £13bn as a consequence.

Nimesh Shah of accountants Blick Rothenberg said: “The UK tax burden is at its highest levels in modern peace time and changes to tax, labour laws and the minimum wage increase have added significant burden to businesses".

“The irony is that the Government increasing the tax burden has had the effect of increasing HMRC’s tax losses.”

[dan hare @djhare]

@whydontyoutube One of the first sporting memories getting up early on the Sunday morning.

[dan hare @djhare]

@RagavanThurair Why emulate the reason why people hate phone calls ?

[dan hare @djhare]

@gaylesian @pam__21_ You have a good rasp of the question

[dan hare @djhare]

@stokel He's a slop cannon

[dan hare @djhare]

@Britains___Pubs @PubHistoryTours The Pearl of London, finish at Cross Keys before curry at Haweli 👍

[dan hare @djhare]

@gaylesian I queued up outside Our Price in Watford to buy "Hatful of Hollow" and it was ace.

[dan hare @djhare]

@danwootton Racist, misogynist, jumped up patronising passive aggressive wet rag.
He forgets himself.

[dan hare @djhare]

https://t.co/pdDcfdAcKv
@Dominic2306 frustrates in his "the system is working as designed" gnomic posts, and the sheer stupidity of Barnard Castle, but this tour de force will have British people who care sadly nodding along at the enshittification of our institutions.

[Whig @vulpine2020]

@itvpeston @JohnHealey_MP Norway’s fund was started in 1996. Labour could have done it in 1997 but was too busy spending. We didn’t set up such a fund in the ‘80s was because we had such high levels of debt caused by the errors of socialist postwar policies