India’s another blow to China in the Indo-Pacific

Navjit Singh | Updated: January 13, 2022, 1:02 PM

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India’s another blow to China in the Indo-Pacific

India and Sri Lanka struck a deal to redevelop the Trincomalee oil tank farms after an arduous effort of more than thirty years. It is a success for Indian policymakers and diplomatic community from a trade and economic perspective, and it also has the potential to impact the strategic situation in the Indian Ocean Region in favour of New Delhi.

Considering the fact that the announcement came on the eve of the Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s Colombo visit, the deal definitely gives a strategic angle in the competition between two power-houses of Asia, India and China as the former is pulling the strings to safeguard its backyard from latter’s encroachment measures in the Indian Ocean and its island nations i.e. India’s ‘sphere of influence’.

The agreement also has the potential to make the India-Sri Lanka relationship to come back on track, especially after the Chinese economic incursion in SL has created a strategic imbalance in the region which had developed tensions between India and Sri Lanka.

Some History

During the Tamil insurgency in Sri Lanka in the 80s, New Delhi pursued the policy of humanitarian military intervention to stop the genocide against the Sri Lankan Tamils, supported the Tigers, and promoted a settlement between majority southern Sinhalese Buddhist and minority northern Tamils.

New Delhi advocated for the Tamils rights, aided Tigers with material resources due to the fear of spilling out the conflict in southern parts of India originated from northern areas of Sri Lanka, but Beijing threw its weight behind Colombo-ruling majority-Sinhalese government, provided political support and military assistance to suppress the Tigers' guerrilla forces.

After Colombo crushed the insurgency and ended civil war in ’09, as expected, Chinese bagged the major infrastructure projects including contracts to build Port City Colombo, Hambantota port, and Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport — in a way, Beijing was emerged victorious in the civil war, successful in materialising the economic gains wished to achieve while it supported the Sinhalese-majority government, widely seen as a major strategic win for China.

While India fought for the autonomy of Tamilians in Sri Lanka, Beijing simply proclaimed “Non-intervention” in national sovereignty of the land, coming out as a good guy who would support the national government, even in civil war, and later on, reap out the economic benefits out of the country which would have strategic implications as another power is situated in the country’s proximity.

Result? Sinhalese-majority Colombo government prioritised the Chinese state-backed infrastructure projects and investments while putting the Indian investments in the back burner, generating the anxiety in New Delhi of losing the ‘sphere of influence' to its rival in Asia-pacific theatre with whom New Delhi is also contesting on its Himalayan Borders.

A major strategic threat to the country, but the tide appears to be turning in favour of New Delhi as Colombo recognises the dangers of tilting too far towards the Beijing. Colombo realised that Chinese are merely using it as a pawn in containing Indians in the power game of dominating the Indian Ocean theatre.

Another concern raised in Colombo was the infringement of national sovereignty due to Chinese encroachment policies such as debt-trap. In every project, investment that goes to Chinese company, Sri Lanka loses a part of its sovereignty. Beijing has similar experiences in South China Sea where littoral countries are suffering from the Chinese expansionist policies which also began with winning infrastructure projects in those countries. These countries felt there are ‘no strings attached’ with Chinese investments, but later realised the hidden motives of Beijing.

The Sinhalese majority’s concerns about sovereignty against China, once aimed at India, are beginning to find expression against China, whose presence in the country has grown rapidly.

Current Developments

The latest wave returned to the Indian shore is the oil agreement between Lankan IOC and Ceylon Petroleum Corporation. The signing of agreement is a milestone for New Delhi’s long-term goals in Sri Lanka to gain the lost confidence in its government since 80s insurgency, and in short-term, it will serve as a step to contract the growing foothold of Chinese investors on Lankan land.

This is a long-stalled and controversial project in Sri Lanka’s eastern Trincomalee district which has an enviable natural harbour. While Indian involvement in a strategic national asset is viewed with suspicion by Sri Lanka’s Sinhala nationalist forces, which prefer the Chinese-funding infrastructure projects due to their dislike of New Delhi’s stance on Tamilians, New Delhi has been keen in partnering Sri Lanka in developing the World War II-era storage tanks, since it was first discussed around the time of the then Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and the former Sri Lankan President J R Jayewarndene as part of the annexure to the India-Sri Lanka Accord of July 29, 1987. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during his visit to the island nation in 2015, spoke of developing Trincomalee as a “regional hub”.

According to a press statement issued by the SL's Department of Government Information on decisions taken at the first cabinet meeting of the year held on Monday, India and Sri Lanka “have reached an agreement to implement a joint development project” through diplomatic talks.

“Accordingly, the Cabinet of Ministers approved a proposal presented by Minister of Power to allocate 24 oil tanks for the business activities of the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation, to allocate 14 tanks of the Lower Oil Tank Complex already in use by Lanka IOC for the company’s business activities, and to implement a development project by a company named Trinco Petroleum Terminal Pvt. Ltd. of the remaining 61 tanks, 51% to be owned by Ceylon Petroleum Corporation and 49% by Lanka IOC,” the statement said, reaffirming Minister Udaya Gammanpila’s announcement last week.

Before this latest stint, in December ’21, Chinese firm Sino Soar Hybrid Technology was dropped from the Asian Development Bank (ABD) funded solar energy project, and suspended its current activities on the northern islands of Sri Lanka.

The tweet by Colombo-based Chinese embassy mentioned about a Chinese company shifting its solar energy project from northern Sri Lanka to the Maldives, in the wake of "security concerns from a third party." While the Embassy did not name the party, it was clearly alluding to India that objected to the Chinese project in three islands off Jaffna peninsula.

Earlier that year, in January, Sri Lanka’s cabinet cleared the project in its northern islands Nainativu, Delft or Neduntheevu, and Analaitivu, located off Jaffna Peninsula in the Palk Bay, some 50 km off Tamil Nadu which raised the alarming bells in Indian strategic circle that needed to be undone. New Delhi offered $12 million to execute the project which could have fatal consequences if we look at it from a security perspective. Even Tamil parties in Sri Lanka objected the handing-over of the land to develop the solar energy parks to Chinese company, and they blamed the Sinhalese-majority government for such a move to reduce the Indian influence in the northern part of the Sri Lanka, the areas dominated by Tamilian minority. The minority population played to their soft-side for New Delhi’s investments and involvement in economic matters, which would ultimately reflect on their identity politics.

Beijing is conscious to animosity which northern Tamilians carry against Sinhalese-majority government, and even against China. That is why Beijing is making efforts to woo the people of the north to reduce the dependency of people on New Delhi on socio-political front.

In one such effort, to make up for losing the contract, and especially to dampen the positive trip of the Sri Lankan Finance Minister, Basil Rajapaksa to New Delhi, Chinese Ambassador to Colombo, Amb Qi Zhenhong offered prayers at Nallur Kandaswami Temple, a major religious site of Tamil-Hindus which attracts Tamil-Hindu diaspora pilgrims in large numbers, especially during the annual festival in months of August and September.

He religiously wore a veshti, went bare-chested, and performed all local Hindu rituals. Thus, seeking to impress the faceless Jaffna cultural czars, who have arrogated to themselves the guardianship of Tamil social life and ethnic politics from inside the country and outside.

The unprecedented visit by Zhenhong to the ethnically-sensitive Tamil-majority Jaffna Peninsula from across the Indian shores have flagged a greater Indian strategic concern due to the historic reasons.

Beijing is diving into the deep waters by indulging in the socio-politico-ethnic realm of northern Sri Lanka just to counter the India’s strategic interests. This can prove to be a big risk considering the fact that Tamilians would any day choose New Delhi over Beijing, and latter might burn its hand while putting into the sensitive ‘ethnic-issue’.

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