Employer of Record in British Indian Ocean Territory

The British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) is a United Kingdom Overseas Territory located in the Indian Ocean midway between Tanzania and Indonesia. The territory includes the seven atolls of the Chagos Archipelago, as well as over 1,000 separate islands, many of which are quite tiny, for a total land area of 60 square kilometers (23 sq mi). Diego Garcia, the biggest and most southerly island, is 27 km2 (10 sq mi) in size and home to a Joint Military Facility of the United Kingdom and the United States.

The sole residents are British and American military personnel and related contractors, totaling roughly 3,000 people (2018 figures). Between 1968 and 1973, Chagossians were forcibly removed from the Chagos Archipelago. The Chagossians, who numbered about 2,000 people at the time, were relocated to Mauritius and Seychelles by the UK government in order to build the military station. The exiled Chagossians are still attempting to return, claiming that their forced deportation and dispossession was illegal, but the UK government has consistently refused them the right to return. Chagossians, casual visitors, and the media are not permitted on the islands.

Since the 1980s, the Mauritius government has been attempting to reclaim sovereignty of the Chagos Archipelago, which was detached from the then-Crown Colony of Mauritius by the United Kingdom in 1965 to create the British Indian Ocean Territory. The International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion in February 2019 calling for the islands to be returned to Mauritius. Similar verdicts have been made by the United Nations General Assembly and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea since then.