India<\/a>, China got the red-carpet welcome in the island nation, including on strategic matters. While because of being a close neighbour New Delhi avoided being tough with Colombo, rather its concerns were accommodated and addressed to the extent that this year in March, India abstained from supporting a UN Human Rights Council resolution in Geneva that called for a probe into alleged war crimes by Sri Lanka in the last phase of its anti-LTTE operation in 2009. Yet, such a gesture together with India\u2019s continued help to Colombo in its developmental course, have in recent days, failed to derive political and diplomatic dividends from the island nation.<\/p>\nIn May when India\u2019s stand-off with China in Ladakh was at its peak, one Chinese warship and one submarine were allowed to be there on the island port. But the alarm bells started ringing fiercely when in the first week of November, the Chinese submarine Changzeng-2 and warship Chang Xing Dao docked at Colombo\u2019s harbour for five days. All this took place even while India and Sri Lanka renewed their commitment to protect each other\u2019s economic, territorial and strategic interests during Lankan Defence Secretary and President Mahinda Rajapaksa\u2019s younger brother Gotabaya Rajapaksa visit to New Delhi in October.<\/p>\n
India quickly warned the island country that Chinese naval ships\u2019 presence in the Bay of Bengal was unacceptable. Colombo and Beijing dismissed New Delhi\u2019s concerns. Beijing\u2019s Defence Ministry maintained that these submarines were on refuelling stops during anti-piracy missions in the Indian Ocean. But this is a ploy; Colombo knowing the rivalry between the two Asian giants, is trying to play off both countries against each other. It has accommodated an alarming number of Chinese warships in the Bay of Bengal.<\/p>\n
In the last four years, more than 230 Chinese warships had called at Colombo port for goodwill visits or refuelling. This has raised concern among strategic community as these developments suggest China\u2019s keenness to widen its orbit of patrols beyond Chinese waters for control of highly important sea lanes of the Indian Ocean. Through this, as per the Journal of the Indian Ocean Region, more than 80 percent of the world\u2019s oil and other goods are shipped. According to the journal, 40 percent passes through the Strait of Hormuz, about 35 percent through the Strait of Malacca and 8 percent through the Bab el-Mandab Strait \u2014 all Indian Ocean\u2019s parts.<\/p>\n
Colombo’s actions put off India<\/strong><\/p>\nChina\u2019s attempt to revive its ancient silk route through these Indian Ocean\u2019s sea lanes and Colombo\u2019s consistent move to host Chinese warships in the Bay of Bengal have not gone down well with India\u2019s policy makers. Though it is not clear whether the recent visit undertaken by Defence Secretary R. K. Mathur to Colombo was in connection with such developments or not, but it is apparent that India doesn\u2019t concur with its neighbour\u2019s proclivity with China on issues that have bearings on India\u2019s security.<\/p>\n
However, there is no gain saying the fact that for giving Sri Lanka an opportunity to close its ranks with China, New Delhi too is responsible. Tamil Nadu\u2019s politics has been allowed to play short shrift with India\u2019s Sri Lanka policy. In 2009, 2012 and 2013 New Delhi sided with US-backed resolution at the Geneva-based Human Rights Council, while countries like China voted against it. Apparently, it was done by the previous UPA government to keep its southern ally, the DMK in good humour. But in turn, it created a gulf in relationship between India and Mahinda Rajapaksa-led Sri Lankan government which otherwise looked at China to fill the void created by New Delhi, largely on political and diplomatic turf.<\/p>\n
Lucrative benefits for China<\/strong><\/p>\nFinding it as a big opportunity, China suffused with surplus money, extended the facility of soft power to take Sri Lanka in its octopus grip. In recent years, China has provided large loans on generous repayments to Sri Lanka besides, investing in major infrastructure projects such as roads, dams, ports, power plants and railways of the island country.<\/p>\n
These lucrative benefits derived from Beijing together with September visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping\u2019s have played a key role in building the current relationship between the two countries. It can be assumed from the fact that Sri Lanka has agreed to join China launched the Maritime Silk Road (MSR). At a seminar held recently, a number of experts including Sri Lankan Central Bank\u2019s Governor Ajith Nivard Cabral and Chinese Ambassador Wu Jiangho spoke high of benefits of the ambitious Chinese project to revive the ancient sea route linking East Asia with Europe via Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n
Thereby, with China already completing the task of building the first phase of Sri Lanka\u2019s Hambantota Port, considered to be another major strategic port after Beijing built Gwadar Port of Pakistan and Chittagong Port of Bangladesh, Colombo\u2019s commitment to join the Maritime Silk Road reflects Sri Lanka\u2019s willful decision to go along China\u2019s way at the cost of India\u2019s maritime interests.<\/p>\n
There is no denying the fact that the MSR is a key strategic project for China in the Indian Ocean. It is aimed at increasing China\u2019s footprints in South Asian shipping routes wherein Sri Lanka\u2019s Hambantota will serve as a gateway port to China\u2019s design to gain strategic depth all the way up to Iran\u2019s coast. This has thrown a challenge before India which along with giving speed to development of border infrastructure project, has to act fast on its Iran-based Chabhahar Port project and Myanmar\u2019s Sittwe project, a deepwater port which on completion will enhance India\u2019s strategic depth in the Southeast Asian region. The $120 million project which would become fully operational by 2015, is part of India\u2019s Kaladan Multi-Model Transit Transport Project, will connect India from Aizwal in Mizoram to Thailand through Myanmar.<\/p>\n
Hope in muddled waters<\/strong><\/p>\nAmidst this, the appointment of full-time Defence Minister in Manohar Parrikar is seen as the Narendra Modi government\u2019s move to speeden up the process of meeting strategic challenges thrown around India by countries like China.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the heat of May 2009, Sri Lankan forces captured and killed fearsome Prabhakan\u2019s Liberation of Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). Arms and ammunition supplied from China were used mightily by Sri Lankan forces for their anti-LTTE operation that brought with this a gradual change in Sri Lanka\u2019s world view. Changing equations So, instead of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1801,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11315],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-37425","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-india"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1801"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37425"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39749,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37425\/revisions\/39749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mapsofindia.com\/my-india\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}