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Sri Lanka is no pearl on China’s string: President
[SUB]President Mahinda Rajapaksa met representatives of the foreign media resident here at Temple Trees today (31). Pic by - Sudath Silva [/SUB]
President Mahinda Rajapaksa was emphatic: China’s presence in Sri Lanka is strictly business, and not political.
Challenged on speculation that China financed and built the $1.4 billion Mahinda Rajapaksa port on Sri Lanka’s south coast so it could sneak a naval base into India’s backyard, Rajapaksa laughed and said his giant neighbour had not complained.
“No one has said anything to us, not India, not even the U.S. Even the U.S., the British and India are now inviting China to come and invest,” he said on Tuesday at a meeting with foreign journalists.
Located just off of India’s southern tip, the island of 21 million has become a visible front in the cold war between the Asian giants, where mutual suspicion crossbred with commercial ambition have produced a construction arms race of sorts.
“They try to match each other. A coal plant on one side of the country by the Chinese, another by the Indians on the other side. A port in the south by the Chinese, a port in the north by the Indians,” said a European diplomat based in Colombo.
Sri Lanka’s location astride an ancient and lucrative trade route in the Indian Ocean makes it of strategic commercial and military interest to Washington, New Delhi and Beijing.
That, some analysts theorize, makes it a prime part of China’s so-called “String of Pearls” strategy to surround India and project its presence by setting up coaling stations under commercial auspices at port after port in the Indian Ocean.
So far, the weapons of influence have been financial: India and China have both funded huge chunks of Rajapaksa’s $6 billion post-war overhaul of roads, railways, ports and power plants.
more and source
[SUB]President Mahinda Rajapaksa met representatives of the foreign media resident here at Temple Trees today (31). Pic by - Sudath Silva [/SUB]
President Mahinda Rajapaksa was emphatic: China’s presence in Sri Lanka is strictly business, and not political.
Challenged on speculation that China financed and built the $1.4 billion Mahinda Rajapaksa port on Sri Lanka’s south coast so it could sneak a naval base into India’s backyard, Rajapaksa laughed and said his giant neighbour had not complained.
“No one has said anything to us, not India, not even the U.S. Even the U.S., the British and India are now inviting China to come and invest,” he said on Tuesday at a meeting with foreign journalists.
Located just off of India’s southern tip, the island of 21 million has become a visible front in the cold war between the Asian giants, where mutual suspicion crossbred with commercial ambition have produced a construction arms race of sorts.
“They try to match each other. A coal plant on one side of the country by the Chinese, another by the Indians on the other side. A port in the south by the Chinese, a port in the north by the Indians,” said a European diplomat based in Colombo.
Sri Lanka’s location astride an ancient and lucrative trade route in the Indian Ocean makes it of strategic commercial and military interest to Washington, New Delhi and Beijing.
That, some analysts theorize, makes it a prime part of China’s so-called “String of Pearls” strategy to surround India and project its presence by setting up coaling stations under commercial auspices at port after port in the Indian Ocean.
So far, the weapons of influence have been financial: India and China have both funded huge chunks of Rajapaksa’s $6 billion post-war overhaul of roads, railways, ports and power plants.
more and source
