China reassured Sri Lanka that it remains committed to helping the country resolve its financial difficulties, after President Gotabaya Rajapaksa said that Beijing appeared to be shifting its strategic focus elsewhere.
“South Asian countries, along with the other countries in our neighboring areas, are China’s priority in its diplomacy,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said Wednesday at a regular press briefing in Beijing. “China attaches great importance to forging closer good neighborly relations with its neighbors and has worked hard to this end.”
“As traditional friendly neighbors, China pays close attention to and feels for the difficulties and challenges facing Sri Lanka,” he added.
The comments come after Rajapaksa said China appeared to be shifting its strategic focus toward Southeast Asia and Africa, noting that South Asian countries in financial trouble aren’t getting the same attention from Beijing as before. Rajapaksa also said Sri Lanka couldn’t tap a $1.5 billion currency swap from Beijing and had yet to hear back on his request to President Xi Jinping for a $1 billion loan to buy essential goods.
“They have less interest in this region,” Rajapaksa said in an interview with Bloomberg News on Monday. “I don’t know whether I am right or wrong, even the focus on Pakistan has gone down. That shows that their interest here is not like earlier. Their interest has shifted to two other areas.”
China Shifting Focus to Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka President Says
Sri Lanka and Pakistan have been some of the biggest recipients of China’s largesse over the past decade, with Beijing extending billions of dollars in credit to build ports, power plants and other infrastructure. In recent months, however, Beijing has taken its time reissuing a loan to Pakistan and hesitated in responding to Sri Lanka’s request for fresh credit as the International Monetary Fund negotiates lending programs with both nations.
Zhao defended China’s actions, noting it had given emergency humanitarian assistance including rice and medicine. He also said Chinese financial institutions also reached out to Sri Lanka and “expressed their readiness to find a proper way to handle the matured debts related to China.”
“We hope Sri Lanka will work actively with China in a similar spirit and work out a feasible solution expeditiously,” Zhao added. “China is ready to work with relevant countries and international financial institutions to continue to play a positive role in supporting Sri Lanka’s response to current difficulties and efforts to ease debt burden and realize sustainable development.”
Bloomberg (Source)