Eighteen members of the Chagos Refugee Group (CRG) are leaving Mauritius this Tuesday to lay wreaths on the tombs of their ancestors in the Chagos Archipelago at 1920km north of Mauritius.
CRG President Olivier Bancoult said on Tuesday that the ceremony is being held within the framework of the All Souls’ Day on 2nd November.
Bancoult averred that the British government financed this humanitarian gesture.
He narrated that when his people did not have access to the archipelago, they laid wreaths at the door of the British High Commission in Port Louis on each 2nd November.
This was done, he said, in order to press the British to allow us to return to the Chagos on that date.
Bancoult pointed out that the delegation visiting the archipelago comprises old people who may have a last chance to see their homeland.
The British authorities have refused to allow a Mauritian priest to accompany the delegation and have insisted that only Chagossians be in the group, he explained.
The delegation will travel to Singapore on Tuesday from where they will join the Chagos Archipelago in the middle of the Indian Ocean by US military aircraft, Bancoult said.
Prior to the independence of Mauritius in March 1968, the Chagossian population was expelled to Mauritius and Seychelles in 1965 by the then British colonial powers.
The islands were then rented to the Americans who have built a huge air force base on the main island, Diego Garcia.
Mauritius has always claimed its sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago.
Source African Press Agency
