US President Donald Trump has described the UK’s deal to hand the Chagos Islands to Mauritius and lease back a key military base as an “act of great stupidity”, months after he endorsed the move.
The UK signed the £3.4bn ($4.6bn) agreement in May, under which it will retain control of a UK-US military base on the largest of the islands, Diego Garcia.
Trump had indicated he was prepared to back the deal.
In a post on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday, the US president said it was “another in a very long line of National Security reasons why Greenland has to be acquired”.
“Shockingly, our ‘brilliant’ NATO Ally, the United Kingdom, is currently planning to give away the Island of Diego Garcia, the site of a vital U.S. Military Base, to Mauritius, and to do so FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER,” he said.
Trump added: “There is no doubt that China and Russia have noticed this act of total weakness.”
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