82 Facts About Mauritius

The British colony of Mauritius included Rodrigues, Agalega, St Brandon, Tromelin, the Chagos Archipelago, and, until 1906, the Seychelles.

Mauritius remained a primarily plantation-based colony of the United Kingdom until independence in 1968.

In 1965, three years before Mauritius became independent, the UK split off the Chagos Archipelago from Mauritian territory, and split off the islands of Aldabra, Farquhar, and Desroches from the Seychelles, to form the British Indian Ocean Territory.

The island's government is closely modelled on the Westminster parliamentary system and Mauritius is highly ranked for economic and political freedom along with being the only African country with full democracy.

Mauritius is the continent's only country with "very high" Human Development Index.

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Mauritius is ranked as the most competitive, and one of the most developed economies in the African region.

In 2019, Mauritius was ranked the most peaceful African country by the Global Peace Index.

From this, it appears that Mauritius bore the name Dina Arobi, very likely the name shared with the Portuguese by sailors from the subcontinent.

Mauritius is commonly known as Maurice and Ile Maurice in French, Moris in Mauritian Creole.

Island of Mauritius was uninhabited before its first recorded visit by Portuguese sailors in the beginning of the 16th century.

The swift conquest of Mauritius was fictionalised in the novel The Mauritius Command by Patrick O'Brian, first published in 1977.

Mauritius managed to escape from prison and plotted a rebellion that would free the island's slaves.

Mauritius was betrayed by his associate Laizaf and was caught by a group of militiamen led by Franco-Mauritian lawyer Adrien d'Epinay and summarily executed.

Mauritius was beheaded at Plaine Verte on 15 April 1822, and his head was displayed as a deterrent against possible slave rebellions.

Mauritius made Port Louis become a municipality so that the citizens could administer the town through their own elected representatives.

Mauritius stayed on the island for two weeks, and urged the Indo-Mauritian community to take an interest in education and to play a more active role in politics.

Coat of arms of Mauritius was adopted in 1906, consisting of an Sambur deer and the extinct dodo, which has currently been a symbol of national identity since independence.

The movement rapidly collapsed because none of the candidates who wanted Mauritius to be given back to France were elected in the 1921 elections.

Mauritius was never really threatened, but in 1943 several British ships were sunk outside Port Louis by German submarines.

Mauritius adopted a new constitution, and independence was proclaimed on 12 March 1968.

On 12 March 1992, twenty-four years after independence, Mauritius was proclaimed a republic within the Commonwealth of Nations.

On 25 July 2020, Japanese-owned bulk carrier MV Wakashio ran aground on a coral reef off the coast of Mauritius, leaking up to 1, 000 tonnes of heavy oil into a pristine lagoon.

Mauritius Island is relatively young geologically, having been created by volcanic activity some 8 million years ago.

Mauritius is encircled by a broken ring of mountain ranges, varying in height from 300 to 800 metres above sea level.

In 2016, the Chagossian population was estimated at 8, 700 in Mauritius, including 483 natives; 350 Chagossians live in the Seychelles, including 75 natives, while 3, 000, including 127 natives, live in the UK.

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France officially ceded Mauritius including all its dependencies to Britain through the Treaty of Paris, signed on 30 May 1814 and in which Reunion was returned to France.

The British Colony of Mauritius consisted of the main island of Mauritius along with its dependencies Rodrigues, Agalega, St Brandon, Tromelin and the Chagos Archipelago, while the Seychelles became a separate colony in 1906.

Mauritius's claim is based on the fact that the transfer of Isle de France and its dependencies to Britain in 1814 was general in nature, that it was beyond those called out in the Treaty of Paris, and that all the dependencies of Isle de France were not specifically mentioned in the Treaty.

Mauritius's claim is that since Tromelin was a dependency of Isle de France, it was 'de facto' transferred to Britain in 1814.

In 1959, British officials in Mauritius informed the World Meteorological Organization that it considered Tromelin to be part of its territory.

In 1965, three years before the independence of Mauritius, the United Kingdom split the Chagos Archipelago from Mauritius and the islands of Aldabra, Farquhar and Desroches from the Seychelles to form the British Indian Ocean Territory.

Mauritius has repeatedly asserted that the separation of its territories is a violation of United Nations resolutions banning the dismemberment of colonial territories before independence and claims that the Chagos Archipelago, including Diego Garcia, forms an integral part of the territory of Mauritius under both Mauritian law and international law.

Mauritius considers the territorial sea of the Chagos Archipelago and Tromelin island as part of its exclusive economic zone.

On 20 December 2010, Mauritius initiated proceedings against the United Kingdom under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea to challenge the legality of the Chagos Marine Protected Area (MPA), which the UK purported to declare around the Chagos Archipelago in April 2010.

Sovereignty of Mauritius was explicitly recognized by two of the arbitrators and denied by none of the other three.

Tribunal's decision determined that the UK's undertaking to return the Chagos Archipelago to Mauritius gives Mauritius an interest in significant decisions that bear upon possible future uses of the archipelago.

In 2004, following the decision of the British government to promulgate the British Indian Ocean Territory Order, which prohibited the Chagossians from remaining on the islands without express authorisation, Mauritius contemplated recourse to the International Court of Justice to finally and conclusively settle the dispute.

The effect of the British exclusionary clause would thus have prevented Mauritius from resorting to the court on the Chagos dispute because it is a member of the Commonwealth.

When Mauritius threatened to leave the Commonwealth, the United Kingdom quickly amended its exclusion clause to exclude any disputes between itself, Commonwealth States and former Commonwealth States, thereby quashing any Mauritian hopes to ever have recourse to the contentious jurisdiction of the court, even if it left.

The UK apologised for the "shameful" way islanders were evicted from the Chagos Archipelago but were insistent that Mauritius was wrong to bring the dispute over sovereignty of the strategic atoll group to the United Nations' highest court.

The president of the court, Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf, said the detachment of the Chagos Archipelago in 1965 from Mauritius had not been based on a "free and genuine expression of the people concerned".

On 1 May 2019, the UK Foreign Office minister Alan Duncan stated that Mauritius has never held sovereignty over the archipelago and the UK does not recognise its claim.

Mauritius stated that the ruling was merely an advisory opinion and not a legally binding judgment.

Mauritius expressed his concern that the UK government appears ready to disregard international law and ignore a ruling of the international court and the right of the Chagossians to return to their homes.

Environment in Mauritius is typically tropical in the coastal regions with forests in the mountainous areas.

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Mauritius ranked second in an air quality index released by the World Health Organization in 2011.

Politics of Mauritius take place in a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic republic, in which the President is the head of state and the Prime Minister is the head of government, assisted by a Council of Ministers.

Island of Mauritius is divided into 20 constituencies that return three members each.

Mauritius is a democracy with a government elected every five years.

The island of Mauritius is subdivided into nine districts, which are the country's second-order administrative divisions.

All military, police, and security functions in Mauritius are carried out by 10, 000 active-duty personnel under the Commissioner of Police.

Mauritius has a special operations military known as 'GIPM' that would intervene in any terrorist attack or high risk operations.

Mauritius has strong and friendly relations with various African, American, Asian, European and Oceania countries.

Mauritius established diplomatic relations with China in April 1972 and was forced to defend this decision, along with naval contracts with the USSR in the same year.

Mauritius is a member of the United Nations, the World Trade Organization, the African Union, the Commonwealth of Nations, La Francophonie, the Southern Africa Development Community, the Indian Ocean Commission, the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, and the Indian Ocean Rim Association.

Mauritius has a hybrid legal system derived from British common law and the French civil law.

The Constitution of Mauritius established the separation of powers between the legislature, the executive and the judiciary and guaranteed the protection of the fundamental rights and freedoms of the individual.

Mauritius has a single-structured judicial system consisting of two tiers, the Supreme Court and subordinate courts.

The population on the island of Mauritius was 1, 222, 340, and that of Rodrigues island was 43, 371; Agalega and Saint Brandon had an estimated total population of 274.

Mauritius is a multiethnic society, drawn from Indian, African, Chinese and European origin.

Schedule I, Paragraph of the Constitution states that The population of Mauritius shall be regarded as including a Hindu community, a Muslim community, and a Sino-Mauritian community, and every person who does not appear, from his way of life, to belong to one or other of those three communities shall be regarded as belonging to the General Population, which shall itself be regarded as a fourth community.

Thus each ethnic group in Mauritius falls within one of the four main communities known as Hindus, General Population, Muslims and Sino-Mauritians.

The constitution of Mauritius is written in English, while some laws, such as the Civil code and Criminal code, are in French.

The government of Mauritius provides free education to its citizens from pre-primary to tertiary level.

Mauritius was ranked 52nd in the Global Innovation Index in 2021, 1st in Africa.

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Since independence from Britain in 1968, Mauritius has developed from a low-income, agriculture-based economy to a high-income diversified economy, based on tourism, textiles, sugar, and financial services.

Mauritius has no exploitable fossil fuel reserves and so relies on petroleum products to meet most of its energy requirements.

Mauritius has one of the largest exclusive economic zones in the world, and in 2012 the government announced its intention to develop the marine economy.

Mauritius is ranked high in terms of economic competitiveness, a friendly investment climate, good governance and a free economy.

Mauritius has a high-income economy, according to the World Bank in 2019.

In June 2015, Mauritius adhered to the multilateral Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters, and has an exchange information mechanism with 127 jurisdictions.

Mauritius is a founding member of the Eastern and Southern Africa Anti Money Laundering Group and has been at the forefront in the fight against money laundering and other forms of financial crime.

Mauritius is a major tourist destination, and the tourism sector is the fourth contributor to the Mauritian economy.

Mauritius currently has two UNESCO World Heritage Sites, namely, Aapravasi Ghat and Le Morne Cultural Landscape.

Since 2005 public buses in Mauritius have been free of charge for students, people with disabilities and senior citizens.

Mauritius has a serious traffic problem due to the high number of road users, particularly car drivers.

Mauritius is connected to global Internet infrastructure via multiple optical fibre submarine communications cables, including the Lower Indian Ocean Network cable, the Mauritius–Rodrigues Submarine Cable, and the South Africa Far East (SAFE) cable.

Mauritius is the source of the Mauritius "Post Office" stamps, among the rarest postage stamps in the world, last sold for $4 million, and considered "the greatest item in all philately" by some.

Distinctive architecture of Mauritius reflects the island nation's history as a colonial trade base connecting Europe with the East.

Major musical genres of Mauritius are Sega and its fusion genre, Seggae, Bhojpuri folk songs, Indian movie music especially Bollywood, and Classical music mainly Western classical music and Indian classical music.

Public holidays of Mauritius involve the blending of several cultures from Mauritius's history.

Mauritius won its first Olympic medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing when boxer Bruno Julie won the bronze medal.