One bet without much risk of losing would be that if Eric Arthur Blair, nicknamed George Orwell, had lived, he would have been inspired to write the Cattle Farm or some dystopia of the 1984 level last Thursday, May 22, if he had had had the opportunity to listen to the debate in the UK House of Commons about the Chagos Archipelago. Unfortunately, the author of Homage to Catalonia has been dead for 75 years. But I'm sure it would excite him to have such dystopia hand-in-hand without making up his mind.

Moreover, from his childhood he would have guessed – at least more than the vast majority of British and Europeans – that he was referring to a part of the world. It’s a bit far from Bengal or Burma that Chagos Orwell met directly, but it’s even further from London or the US. Nearby, there is nowhere near the Chagos Archipelago.

The essence of the parliamentary debate was that the government of Keir Starmer has finally signed a deal with the Republic of Mauritius that recognizes the sovereignty of the Chagos archipelago. However, in order for the strategic military base of the United States (where the presence of the United Kingdom is negligible) to remain intact in exchange for a lease of 99 years. As he seems to understand that he won’t be at the White House when the deadline comes, Trump will succumb to the British project he initially took very pessimistically.

Starmer, on the other hand, has sold to his own the certainty of losing all other exits in court. No, but to the Tories and the reformists, who are said to leave the archipelago agreement “in the hands of Mauritius who is going into the arms of China.” Because they're leaving in a mother for 99 years or so. The rent will be paid “for what was ours.”

The only one who is happy, most likely, is Mauritius. Because he will receive rent for something that has never been “his”. The Mauritians and Chadians share the fact that they have been under the same British colonial administration. But in the late 1960s, independence came for some... and deportation for others, so they could give the United States a strategic military base.

One of the most Hittite episodes of the Cold War is the deportation of the Chagos. Which has never been healed, even though the courts have repeatedly resolved the injustice. A further 99-year extension in exile has now been announced to the Chagos who are already the descendants of the deportees. No wonder they're the ones who are really angry.

Perhaps the indignation of others would follow from the bitter memories that this period of 99 years gives them. This is the longest lease period permitted by English law. For example, five years before Orwell was born, he used it to lease the New Territories from Hong Kong. They remember what happened 99 years ago.