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Columbia Encyclopedia entry: Diego Garcia
Diego Garcia, coral island, 11 sq mi (28 sq km). Indian Ocean, largest island of the Chagos Archipelago, SW of Sri Lanka. Part of the British Indian Ocean Territory, the island was leased (1970) to the United States and later developed as a joint U.S.-British naval base to guard the Persian Gulf oil routes and to counter increased Soviet military activities in S Asia and Africa. Some 3,000 islanders were removed to Mauritius and the Seychelles in the late 1960s prior to the construction of the naval base. The military base has had significant strategic value as a staging area in the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

See study by D. Vine (2009).

Wikipedia search results for: Diego Garcia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Diego García is a coral atoll and the largest island in terms of land area, of the Chagos Archipelago. It is part of the British Indian Ocean Territory. The island is located in the Indian Ocean, about 1,600 km south of the southern coast of India. The closest other countries to Diego Garcia are Sri Lanka and Maldives. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach and explore the island of Diego Garcia, with the discovery attributed to the navigator Pêro de Mascarenhas while sailing in a fleet under Dom Garcia de Noronha's leadership during 1512 and 1513. In the 1960s, the Chagos archipelago was secretly leased to the United Kingdom and detached...more »
Columbia Encyclopedia search results: Diego Garcia
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  • British Indian Ocean Territory

    British Indian Ocean Territory, archipelago, c.1,180 mi (1,900 km), NE of Mauritius, in the central Indian Ocean. The islands, which form the Chagos Archipelago and are located on the southern...

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    Spanish American literature, the writings of both the European explorers of Spanish America and its later inhabitants.See also Spanish literature; Portuguese literature; Brazilian literature. ...

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    Spanish literature, the literature of Spain. Literature flourished on the Iberian Peninsula long before the evolution of the modern Spanish language. The Latin writers Seneca, Lucan, Martial, ...

  • Peru, country, South America

    Peru, Span. Perú, officially Republic of Peru, republic (2005 est. pop. 27,926,000), 496,220 sq mi (1,285,210 sq km), W South America. It borders on the Pacific Ocean in the west, on Ecuador a...

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