A Chinese military vessel is scheduled to call at the Sri Lankan Port of Hambantota. The Indian Government, with their concerns for Indian security, has raised the issue with the Sri Lankan government. The Sri Lankan government is heavily in debt and distress partly because of the mega infrastructure of the Hambantota port and many other such projects. The Hambantota port is now the property of a Chinese corporation, having been swapped for part of Sri Lanka debt to a variety of Chinese entities.
China’s interests in the Indian Ocean grew in the context of the ‘One Belt, One Road’ initiative. The OBOR consists of two components; namely the Maritime Silk Road Initiative (MSRI) and the Silk Road Economic Belt (SREB). It constitutes a massive geopolitical project that aims to construct landscapes to enable flow of trade and investment by ‘promoting economic cooperation and connectivity’ between Asia, West Asia, Africa, and Europe.
