India's Modi to back Mauritius sovereignty over Chagos, upgrade security ties

By Rupam Jain

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's Prime Minister Narendra Modi will travel to Mauritius on Tuesday for talks on upgrading strategic ties, days after U.S. President Donald Trump signalled support for a deal between Mauritius and Britain over the future of a U.S.-British military base.

Modi will be the chief guest at the country's national day and hold talks with Mauritius Prime Minister Navinchandra Ramgoolam, who returned to office for his third stint in 2024.

Last month, Trump said he would support a deal between Mauritius and Britain over the future of a U.S.-British base in the Chagos Archipelago, a group of seven atolls comprising more than 60 islands in the Indian Ocean.

Diego Garcia, the largest island of the archipelago, has been used as a joint British-U.S. military base since the 1970s.

Indian officials organising Modi's trip to the island nation said the settling of the Chagos sovereignty issue was welcome news for New Delhi, which has historically backed Mauritius claims over the islands, and more recently supported America's presence in the Indian Ocean to check China's influence.

"During the (Modi's) visit there will be an opportunity perhaps for the Mauritius side to update us on any issues that might still be outstanding... we continue to support Mauritius in its efforts to reach a mutually satisfactory and mutually beneficial deal," India's foreign secretary Vikram Misri told reporters in New Delhi.

Mauritius became independent in 1968 but London retained control of the Chagos, and forcibly displaced up to 2,000 people to make way for the Diego Garcia military base, which it had leased to the U.S. in 1966.

Samuel Bashfield, an expert on Indo-Pacific security at the Australia India Institute, said it was in India's interest to retain the U.S. presence on Diego Garcia as a counterweight to China.

India, in its bid to expand its strategic footprint in the Indian Ocean, helped Mauritius develop sea and air links on the remote Agalega Islands.

"Diego Garcia could be a useful runway for Indian surveillance aircraft in the Indian Ocean to use periodically," said Bashfield.

A source close to Prime Minister Ramgoolam's office said: "Mauritius sees India and the U.S. sharing the same interest of containing the Chinese influence within the region."

China has invested millions of dollars in recent years building seaports and highways in countries stretching from the Maldives to Sri Lanka.

(Reporting by Rupam Jain, additional reporting by Nairobi newsroom, Editing by Alex Richardson)