Britain has proposed handing the Chagos Islands archipelago back to its former colony, Mauritius, while paying to lease back a strategic US-UK military base on Diego Garcia. The decision has been a bone of contention with the Trump administration for months.
During their first face-to-face meeting on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump criticized the deal, describing it as terrible to Prime Minister Andy Burnham. The encounter represented the biggest diplomatic test for Burnham, Britain's sixth prime minister in a decade, and threatened to inflame tensions between the two leaders. However, Trump brushed aside differences over the Middle East and called Burnham a natural business person.
In response to the president's criticism, Defence Secretary Wes Streeting has confirmed a review of the agreement. Britain has suspended its annual lease payments of 139 million euros for the Diego Garcia base while ministers attempt to reshape the deal into one Washington can accept. Meanwhile, the Conservatives have called for the agreement to be scrapped altogether.