Jon Castle and Pete Bouquet are currently under arrest (that's not the first time those words have been written over the years) for sailing into the waters of Diego Garcia uninvited. Those waters are off limits not only to Jon and Pete, but to the people who lived there generation upon generation, and were evicted in the 60s and 70s as part of a secret deal between the US and the UK. The US would get to use the Chagossian Islands (Diego Garcia is the biggest) as a military outpost in their cold war with the Soviet Union. The UK would get knock-down prices on Polaris submarines. And the indigenous people of the islands, who the UK government described as having “little aptitude for anything except growing coconuts,” would simply be kicked out.

As told at the People's Navy website [1]:

The Government split the Chagos Islands from Mauritius, which was heading toward independence, and created a new colony – the British Indian Ocean Territory. It proceeded, in violation of the UN Charter, to remove the islanders through trickery, intimidation and force, by encouraging them to take trips then refusing to let them back, by shutting down the plantations and stopping supply ships.

Some were taken to the Seychelles. The rest were consigned to a life of poverty and unemployment in Mauritius. Many turned to alcohol, drugs and prostitution. Some died from malnutrition. Several committed suicide. They staged demonstrations and hunger strikes, but to little avail. In 1982 the Government awarded the exiles a paltry £4 million – less than £3,000 a head – in compensation, provided that they renounced their right to return. Few could read the documents that they signed with thumb prints.

Since then, UK courts have repeatedly decried the displacement as illegal. But Diego Garcia is now a key outpost in the Bush Administration's war on terror. It certainly is fitting that planes full of prisoners on their way to illegal detention at Guantanamo Bay should be refueled at a military base created by the illegal eviction of its residents.

So far, the only permission that has been granted to the Chagossians to return is for cleanup and maintenance of their ancestral burial grounds.

Jon and Pete are in jail because they believe in a Quaker concept, bearing witness, which was a founding principle for Greenpeace. It's the belief that witnessing an injustice and calling the attention of your community to it is a fundamentally moral act. You can choose to act or not, but you cannot ignore the imperative to choose.

As of March 14, 2008: Jon is officially the Captain of Musichana and has been singled out for violation of immigration laws. The prosecutor is asking for a maximum, which is 6 months suspended prison, 3000 GBP fine and 200 GBP cost.

Jon has plead not guilty. He gave the prosecutor and the court a lecture on the plight of the Chagossians, the rendition flights and the offensive nature of the base. He finished his speech by saying "You better examine your conscience"

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You can follow the progress of the campaign (Pete Bouquet's son, Sam, is also on his way toward the island in a separate ship), voice your opposition to the eviction, and drop a note of support to Jon and Peter at the People's Navy [2] website.