U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo continues his South Asian tour by ending his visit to India, arriving in Sri Lanka on Tuesday night (October 27, 2020).
On Wednesday morning, Mr. Pompeo met with Sri Lankan President Rajapaksa and held talks with Foreign Minister Gunawardena and other senior Sri Lankan officials.
In a joint meeting with Gunawardena with reporters, Pompeo said the United States has a completely different approach to dealing with regional countries than China. He said, “The Communist Party of China is a predator as seen in bad deals, violations of sovereignty and lawlessness on land and sea. The United States is here in a different way. We came here as friends and partners.”
The U.S. State Department said in an earlier statement that Pompeo will highlight the importance of Sri Lanka as a partner in the security and economic sphere in the Indo-Pacific region during his visit and emphasize the U.S. commitment to Sri Lanka’s sovereignty. The U.S., which has assisted Sri Lanka with donations rather than loans, has so far provided $2 billion worth of aid, including $6 million to address the new coronavirus epidemic, the statement said.
Pompeo, the first U.S. secretary of state to visit Sri Lanka in more than a decade, will advise Sri Lankan leaders on how to reduce their dependence on China during his visit.
U.S. officials have repeatedly criticized the Communist regime for providing development funds to developing countries, including Sri Lanka, in the form of unaffordable loans, which have led to debt traps for those countries.
In December 2017, Sri Lanka formally handed over the strategically important port of Hambantota to China under a 99-year lease because of its inability to repay Chinese corporate debt.
President Rajapaksa, who took office last year, had vowed to take back Hambantota during his election campaign, but since taking office he has told visiting senior Chinese officials that the Hambantota deal is not a debt trap.
Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Gunawardena was reluctant to criticize China directly during a joint meeting with Pompeo on Wednesday. He said, “Sri Lanka is a neutral, non-aligned country, committed to peace.” He added, “We want to continue our relations with the United States and other countries.”
In a press conference last week to introduce Pompeo’s South Asia trip, a senior U.S. State Department official said that Sri Lanka now faces a difficult but necessary decision on how to choose a model for economic development. He added, “We encourage Sri Lanka to evaluate the transparent, sustainable economic development options we offer and contrast them with discriminatory and non-transparent practices.”
In a statement issued on Monday, the Chinese Embassy in Sri Lanka said the U.S. statement “fully exposes the U.S. pattern of wantonly interfering in other countries’ domestic and foreign policies and forcing small and medium-sized countries to choose sides. The statement also said, “We are firmly opposed to the U.S. taking the opportunity of the Secretary of State’s visit to provoke and interfere in China-Sri Lanka relations and to use it as an opportunity for coercion and bullying against Sri Lanka.”
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