Prime Minister Keir Starmer wants to review an October political agreement that gives Mauritius sovereignty of the Chagos Islands while securing a 99-year lease on the base.

On Thursday, the British government expressed confidence that the deal to secure the future of a U.S.-British military base on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia would be ratified.

Mauritius Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam said that he had requested an independent review of a confidential draft agreement with Britain regarding the Chagos Islands.

The agreement still has to be ratified by both parties. The arrangement has been questioned by Ramgoolam, who won an election last month. He informed lawmakers on Thursday that the results of the study will be available for his new cabinet to take into account.

The foreign ministry of Britain chose not to react. Earlier this week, British Foreign Minister David Lammy expressed his confidence that the deal would be completed, noting that the Pentagon, State Department, and U.S. intelligence agencies had all embraced it.

According to him, Britain was pleased to provide the new Mauritius administration some time to review the specifics.

When the agreement was announced, U.S. President Joe Biden backed it, but after Donald Trump takes office in January, the next government may contest it.

Marco Rubio, Trump’s choice for secretary of state, has stated that the agreement presents a major risk to American security as it gives the island, which is a key base utilised by American warships and long-range bombers, to a Chinese ally.

London kept control of the Chagos Islands after Mauritius gained independence in the 1960s, and in the 1970s, it forcefully uprooted up to 2,000 inhabitants to create room for the base.

Following years of occasionally contentious discussions, Britain announced last month that it will turn over the islands. Many of the exiled Chagossians, however, claim they were not part of the talks and are unable to support it.

According to Olivier Bancoult of the Chagos Refugees Group, which works to protect Chagossians’ rights, he hopes the assessment will be completed as soon as possible.

On Sunday, South Africa will become the first African nation to chair the G20, but its emphasis on topics like climate change and equitable growth runs the danger of colliding with the harsh realities of trade disputes and diplomatic tensions.

With South Africa taking the helm a year after the African Union was accepted as a permanent member of the G20, it is viewed as a chance to advance policy areas that are essential to the growth of the continent.

Priorities mentioned by President Cyril Ramaphosa include climate change, food security, artificial intelligence, and inclusive economic growth; further information is anticipated next week.

Ramaphosa has stated that his nation will aim to expand on the efforts of its predecessors, making South Africa the fourth emerging market to take over the G20 presidency, which is rotated yearly, following Brazil, India, and Indonesia.

Donald Trump, whose incoming government has promised to impose stringent trade taxes on countries like Canada, Mexico, and China, has sparked concerns about trade wars. The United States will assume power in December 2025.

Additionally, Trump has threatened to undo the climate-related programs he would inherit from President Joe Biden and has essentially disregarded the scientific consensus about the influence of human activity on climate change.

“It will be important for South Africa to ensure that it consolidates positions of the Global South and hands over to the U.S. a solid legacy on issues to avoid the U.S. and Global North diluting or undermining the whole agenda of the Global South,” said David Monyae, director of the Centre for Africa-China Studies at the University of Johannesburg.

The G20 was created to promote international economic cooperation and consists of 19 independent countries in addition to the European and African Unions. It accounts for 67% of the world’s population, 75% of global trade, and 85% of the world economy.

Global polarisation, however, makes the G20’s professed goal more difficult to achieve, since members like the US, China, and Russia are openly at odds over trade and conflicts in the Middle East, Ukraine, and other places.

Rating agencies and the International Monetary Fund have cautioned that trade policies that are becoming more protectionist pose a threat to global growth and may disproportionately affect developing market economies.