In his first overseas trip since taking office, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake visited India this week, meeting Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In a far-ranging joint statement, the two leaders agreed to step up economic, energy, and defence cooperation. President Dissanayake also invited Premier Modi to visit Sri Lanka.
Perhaps most importantly, President Dissanayake assured Modi that Sri Lanka’s territory will not be used “in any way that is detrimental” to India’s interests, a possible reference to Indian concerns about Chinese research vessels docking in Sri Lanka and conducting surveillance. Dissanayake’s predecessor former President Ranil Wickremesinghe instituted a one-year moratorium on such vessels from any countries in January, but that will soon end.
India faces a challenge with the arrival of a few new leaders in its neighbourhood who it sees as pro-Beijing, including President Dissanayake. But his visit reasserted a long-standing partnership with India, and it offers a reminder that China-friendly leaders are not necessarily China-leaning leaders—they just want to balance ties between the two Asian powers better.
For all the talk of President Dissanayake’s Leftist politics and his party’s Marxist past, which suggest that he might align with China ideologically, he has consistently signalled his commitment to partnership with neighbouring India. In February, Dissanayake travelled to India while still a Presidential candidate and met Indian External Affairs Minister (EAM) Dr. S. Jaishankar; they met again in Colombo in October.
Foreign ties
President Dissanayake has said little publicly about his China policy, but he has outlined his intention to strengthen ties with Beijing and New Delhi. China is also a key commercial player in Sri Lanka, especially through its large infrastructure projects. President Dissanayake surely wants to at least maintain that support. He will visit Beijing next month, and a senior Chinese delegation met him in November, likely for preparatory meetings.
President Dissanayake’s desire to balance ties with both powers mirrors the approach of his predecessor, former President Wickremesinghe. The former Sri Lankan leader strengthened economic links with China and embraced its position on a few key issues, including calling the security partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States a “mistake” and labelling the term “Indo Pacific” an “artificial framework.”
But the former President also imposed the moratorium on Chinese research ships and encouraged investment in Sri Lanka from Indian billionaire Gautam Adani, who is close to Modi.
President Dissanayake’s balancing policy is similar to that of another China-friendly leader in the region: Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu. This year, Muizzu expelled the Indian military presence from the Maldives and signed new defence deals with China. But he has never stopped stressing the importance of the country’s partnership with India, particularly on economic matters.
Neighbourhood headaches
In terms of new neighbourhood headaches, President Dissanayake is arguably the least of India’s concerns. Muizzu appears committed to deepening military ties with China. Nepali Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli broke with diplomatic tradition and visited China before India in his fourth term; he signed a deal that could bring Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects to Nepal for the first time.
In Bangladesh, Interim Leader Muhammad Yunus, a strident critic of India, has signalled a desire to strengthen ties with China and Pakistan. But Oli and Yunus have said that they are keen to make relations work with India. After all, most South Asian states are committed to partnership with New Delhi because of economic dependence, strategic imperatives, or historical and cultural ties.
The India-Sri Lanka relationship does face challenges, chief among them are New Delhi’s concerns that Adani’s recent US indictment could lead to deeper scrutiny from Colombo about other Indian investments. President Dissanayake also has not so far indicated a desire to extend Wickremesinghe’s research vessel moratorium, and there are also long-standing tensions over fishing issues between India and Sri Lanka.
But relative to India’s concerns about its other neighbours—including a relationship in crisis with Bangladesh and rapidly worsening conflict in military-ruled Myanmar—these obstacles are all manageable.
Michael Kugelman is the writer of Foreign Policy’s weekly South Asia Brief. He is the director of the South Asia Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington. X: @michaelkugelman
