Dr Stephen Allen, Senior Lecturer in Law at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL), speaks to The Foreign Desk about the dispute between the UK and Mauritius over Chagos Islands. In 1965 the UK separated the Chagos Islands, an archipelago in the middle of the Indian Ocean, from Mauritius to form the British Indian Ocean Territory. Everyone living there was evicted and they have been fighting to return ever since. In June, a vote in the UN referred the matter to the International Court of Justice. Dr Allen said: “Primarily, the main focus of the legal campaign is to have some recognition of their right to return to the Chagos Islands…the right to resettle in the islands, to gain public support and funding for that exercise.”