Chagos islanders stunned as David Cameron rules out return

Statement from British foreign secretary comes just months after his predecessor confirmed resettlement was part of talks with Mauritius

Britain’s foreign secretary, David Cameron, has provoked fury by abruptly ruling out the resettlement of former inhabitants of the Chagos Islands, months after his predecessor revealed that the UK was discussing their potential return.

The former prime minister suggested that a return to the islands was now “not possible” for Chagossians who were forcibly displaced by the British government in the 1960s and 1970s.