Sri Lanka’s president on Saturday gave a grand welcome to Prime Minister Narendra Modi as Colombo balances relations with neighboring India and its largest creditor China.
President Anura Kumar Dissanayake welcomed Modi with a 19-gun salute. Modi is the first foreign dignitary to visit Colombo since the leftist President Dissanayake won last year’s election. Dissanayake and Modi are expected to sign agreements on energy, defense and health, but the highlight of the visit will be the inauguration of a 120-megawatt solar power project supported by India.
A solar power project in the country’s northeastern Trincomalee district had been stalled for years but has been revived as a joint project with support from New Delhi. Modi was accorded a guard of honour at the capital’s Independence Square after arriving in Colombo on Friday evening, praising his “brilliant welcome” in Sri Lanka.
Modi’s visit comes at a time when Colombo is grappling with competing interests from New Delhi and Beijing. New Delhi is concerned about China’s growing influence in Sri Lanka, which India considers to be within its geopolitical sphere of influence.
Regional Collaborators
Dissanayake’s first foreign visit was to New Delhi in December. But he followed that up with a visit to Beijing in January. This highlights Sri Lanka’s efforts to maintain a delicate balance.
China has emerged as Sri Lanka’s largest single bilateral lender, accounting for more than half of its $14 billion in bilateral debt when Sri Lanka defaulted on its sovereign debt in 2022. China was also the first country to restructure its debt to Sri Lanka, a move that helped the island nation escape its worst economic downturn that year.
Colombo also signed a deal in January with a Chinese state-owned company to invest $3.7 billion in an oil refinery in the south of the island. This will be Sri Lanka’s largest single foreign investment and is considered important for the island’s economy. New Delhi has expressed concern over China’s growing influence in Sri Lanka.
Modi’s visit to Sri Lanka follows a summit and meetings with leaders of regional nations in Thailand, where he sought to strengthen India’s ties with its neighbors. Modi held a rare face-to-face meeting with Myanmar’s junta chief Min Aung Hlaing on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC summit in Bangkok, the Bay of Bengal region of the seven-nation grouping.
Modi also spoke with the interim leader of neighboring Bangladesh, Muhammad Yunus, on Friday, the first such meeting since the revolution in Dhaka ousted New Delhi’s longtime ally Sheikh Hasina and strained relations.
India was a major benefactor of Hasina’s government, and cross-border relations deteriorated after her fall. As a result, Yunus decided to make his first state visit to China last month. Modi also met his Nepali counterpart KP Sharma Oli in Bangkok on Friday. He also met with Bhutan’s Tshering Tobgay.
