NEW DELHI – Sri Lanka’s new president Gotabaya Rajapaksa has warned Indiaand Western nations that his country will be forced to seek finance fromChina again if they do not invest in the island.
Rajapaksa told the Hindu newspaper in an interview published Sunday thatother Asian nations would also turn to China’s giant Belt and Roadinfrastructure project without alternative help.
Sri Lanka has traditionally been allied to India but became close to China,securing about $7 billion in loans and investment, when Rajapaksa’s brotherMahinda was president from 2005 to 2015.
“I want to tell India, Japan, Singapore and Australia and other countriesto also come and invest in us,” said the president, who was in India thisweekend on his first foreign trip since winning a presidential election onNovember 16.
“They should tell their companies to invest in Sri Lanka and help us grow,because if they do not, then not only Sri Lanka, but countries all overAsia will have the same (problem).
“The Chinese will take the Belt and Road initiative all over unless othercountries provide an alternative.”
India has been at the forefront of nations wary of Belt and Road, fearingit will reinforce China’s military and strategic clout in the Indian Oceanregion that New Delhi considers its backyard.
China has alloted hundreds of billions of dollars on the network of ports,railways, roads and industrial parks spanning Asia, Africa, the Middle Eastand Europe.
India’s foreign and defence ministers held talks with counterparts fromJapan on Saturday in a bid to step up military cooperation.
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Gotabaya Rajapaksa also confirmed that he wants to renegotiate theagreement with China about the strategic Hambantota port south of Colombothat serves the key shipping lanes between Europe and Asia.
“I believe that the Sri Lankan government must have control of allstrategically important projects like Hambantota,” he said in the interview.
“The next generation will curse our generation for giving away preciousassets otherwise,” he said.
Sri Lanka was forced to hand the port over to China in 2017 on a 99-yearlease after the Sri Lankan government was unable to repay loans taken tobuild it.
India and some Western countries have raised concerns that nations who havetaken Chinese loans under the Belt and Road initiative risk falling into adebt trap.
Rajapaksa said he was certain India’s government under rightwing PrimeMinister Narendra Modi would move past the apprehensions it had over tiesbetween Sri Lanka and China.
“Some of their suspicions were due to our ties with China, but that was amisunderstanding. We had a purely commercial agreement with China,”Rajapaksa said. – APP / AFP
