Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what security measures his Department has put in place to prevent incursions by hostile states into the proposed buffer zone around Diego Garcia.

There will be robust security provisions to protect the base, including full UK control over Diego Garcia, control over the electromagnetic spectrum and unrestricted access to and use of the base by the UK and US; a buffer zone around Diego Garcia in which nothing can be built or put in place without UK consent; a robust mechanism and review process to ensure no activity in the other islands can impinge upon base operations; and a prohibition on the presence of foreign security forces on the outer islands, either civilian or military.