A legal impasse over a group of Sri Lankan Tamil asylum seekers who arrived on the British Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia three years ago has ended with the group being allowed to enter the UK.
The Tamils arrived in the UK this week, the effective winners of a legal battle to avoid being deported from Diego Garcia, which is effectively a UK-US military base. 
The asylum seekers arrived on the island in October 2021, after their boat foundered nearby and they were rescued by British forces based on the island.
Hundreds more arrived by boat in the following months, most of whom accepted voluntary repatriation.
But a few dozen of the initial arrivals stayed on Diego Garcia, housed in tents in a guarded camp, hoping to gain asylum in a safe country.
The group claimed they faced persecution in Sri Lanka because of their ethnic Tamil backgrounds and following the decades-long civil war.
For their first six weeks on Diego Garcia the group was held in isolation, prompting a hunger strike.
There have also been attempted plans to repatriate the asylum seekers to Sri Lanka.
Recently the Supreme Court of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT) found that the asylum seekers were unlawfully detained.

Ms Justice Obi delivered the ruling following a judicial review hearing into claims of unlawful detention and habeas corpus – the law under which people have a right to be brought before a judge or into court unless lawful grounds are given for their detention.
The judgment declared that all 61 individuals, including 16 children, were unlawfully detained from their arrival on the US military base in October 2021 until they left for the UK.
The court held that the claimants had been detained and agreed with the claimants that their detention was unnecessary and unlawful.
After the ruling, lawyers for the British Government announced in November that all of the asylum seekers, except a handful who have been charged with crimes on the island, would be allowed to go to the UK.
In a statement, the British Government said the group’s admission to the UK came because of an “exception” made by government ministers based on their circumstances.
But the statement said no future arrivals on Diego Garcia would be allowed into the UK. Instead, they would be taken to Saint Helena, another British controlled island in the Atlantic Ocean. 
The camp where the asylum seekers were living on Diego Garcia has been disassembled by American forces, media reports said.
The US shares the island’s military base with the UK.
One asylum seeker told media she was celebrating the decision.
“I can go outside, walking, running anywhere. No one asks me anything, like, ‘Why are you going, where are you going.’ No military control,” she said, shortly after arriving in London.
Reports says the group has received permission to stay in the UK for six months.
Any of the asylum seekers who want to stay longer must apply for permission within the six-month period, UK media reports said.
Eight of the asylum seekers have been granted protection by the UK, which means they cannot be ‘refouled’ or forcibly sent back to their country of origin.
Others are appealing the rejection of their bids for protection, but most are waiting for initial decisions by British authorities.