The Sri Lanka Government will not extend the year-long moratorium on foreign Marine Scientific Research (MSR) which comes to an end tonight (31 December 2024), it is learnt.
It is also learnt that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is scrambling to set up a committee to once again, draft a ‘new’ Standard Operational Procedure (SOP) for granting diplomatic clearance for foreign marine research vessels and aircraft to call at Sri Lankan ports, and to grant permission for such MSR to conduct surveys in Sri Lankan waters and within its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).
When contacted about the moratorium coming to an end today, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Foreign Employment and Tourism Vijitha Herath told The Daily Morning that the moratorium put into effect by the previous Ranil Wickremesinghe Government will not be extended.
When asked what the Government plans to do about the thorny diplomatic issue of MSR’s calling on Sri Lankan waters for research, Herath said that the ministry (MFA) will urgently develop a new SOP taking into consideration international best practices, national security concerns and the national interest of Sri Lanka.
The new SOP is expected to be drafted by a new committee which will be headed by the Foreign Minister. When asked what timeline is expected for the drafting of the new SOP, the minister stated: “It will be done in a short period. We will try to complete it quickly”. When asked if foreign MSR’s would arrive in Sri Lankan waters before the new SOP was drafted, the minister opined that none will come that quickly.
The decision by the Foreign Ministry to redraft a new SOP for MSR visit / survey approval process, comes in the wake of the previous government going to great lengths to update the existing one with consolation from many countries including India in 2022/2023. The new plan by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding MSR clearance, begs the question if the Government is reinvesting the wheel?
The already developed ‘New SOP of 2023/24’ which The Sunday Morning reported extensively on, was shared with key diplomatic missions in Colombo earlier this year (2024). It included a new, and specialised annexure to the reviewed SOP for diplomatic clearance for foreign MSRs in Sri Lankan waters and the EEZ includes a robust set of regulations which leads to an approval process and checks compliance following approval. According to that SOP (2023/24), any future MSR request must be made to the MFA six months ahead of the expected date of the research commencing and that any amendments to the MSR application and the survey request must be made two months ahead of the date of commencement. It also includes conditions which makes it mandatory for local collaboration for research or surveys. The SOP which was communicated to all foreign missions, also states that relevant Sri Lankan authorities or designated researchers have a right to participate and must be represented on the research, while the preliminary report and the final report, after the completion of the survey, must be provided to Sri Lankan authorities under the regulations of UNCLOS.