Collateral damage

The decades-long struggle to reverse the UK’s enforced exile of an island nation.

- NIK DIRGA

THE LAST COLONY: A tale of exile, justice and Britain's colonial legacy, by Philippe Sands (Hachette, $34.99) Even by New Zealand standards, the Chagos archipelago is a remote place. The 60 islands in the middle of the Indian Ocean are so small they barely register on most globes, yet they are ground zero in a fight over the remnants of British imperialism.

Fifty years ago, a monumental injustice was committed against its entire population - one terribly few people know about to this day. The Chagos islands were once part of Mauritius, a former British colony that became independent in 1968. When independence came, the Chagos were quietly split off- or "dismembered", as it's memorably described - from Mauritius into British administration. A deal was struck for a joint British and American military base in the Chagos and, to make room, between 1967 and 1973 all 2000 men, women and children who lived there were forcibly removed and exiled to Mauritius.

The area is technically now known as the British Indian Ocean Territory. The US military facilities on Diego Garcia, the largest island, were a key part of the 2003 Iraq War and reportedly a CIA interrogation site. The facility's name for a time was, ironically, Camp Justice.