Chagos Islanders Still in Limbo

A Postscript to an Imported Tradition Where Ignorance Meets Wimpy Idiocy

Chagos Islanders Still in Limbo

'What in the World?' is an Irish series of tv documentaries presented and produced by Peadar King. (See also http://kmfproductions.net) In this episode, Peadar King travels to Mauritius to meet the original inhabitants of the Chagos Islands (Indian Ocean). The Chagos Islanders were secretly and brutally expelled from their homeland by British governments in the late 1960s and early 1970s, to make way for an American military base on the main island of Diego Garcia. For more information and updates on the plight of the Chagossians, please visit the website of the UK Chagos Support Association at www.chagossupport.org.uk.

PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION – GO TO http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/let-the-chagos-islanders-return-home.html

I first posted the following poem in May 2009. I hope you don't mind a second read.

Rounding Up The Dogs of the Children Who Died of Sadness

Monsters came one day, dressed

in stiff uniforms. They were fed

largely on red meat and so had grown

like giants compared to the islanders.

They scarred the land as they drove,

engines growling like hungry beasts,

churning sand and dust into the terrified

eyes of the children. Those little

Brown arms grew powerless at the sight

of fists clutching the collars of their pets.

Never before had they seen such dark

nightmares. The monsters had come

To gather all the dogs of the island.

They were taken amid screams and cries,

hearts cracking like husked coconuts

flung against a jagged rock.

-o-