The US on Wednesday lauded India’s efforts in helping Sri Lanka during the recent crisis there and said it reacted “really swiftly” with an absolutely critical set of measures to help the island nation tide over its economic crisis.
Visiting US Agency for International Development (USAID) administrator Samantha Power also said calls to Beijing to provide significant relief to Sri Lanka have gone unanswered.
The US official said Beijing promised Lines of Credit to Sri Lanka, but it paused to provide significant relief. “The calls to provide more significant relief have gone unanswered and the biggest question of all is whether Beijing will restructure debt to the same extent as other bilateral creditors,” she said.
In an address at an event in Delhi IIT, Power said China became one of Sri Lanka’s “biggest creditors” offering often “opaque loan” deals at higher interest rates than other lenders. Power is on a visit to India from July 25 to 27. The USAID is one of the leading aid agencies globally.
“India has reacted really swiftly with an absolutely critical set of measures,” she said.
The USAID administrator referred to India’s line of credit of USD 3.5 billion to Sri Lanka and other assistance to help the country steer its economy out of default and further collapse.
Power said India has helped countries around the world in times of difficulties.
“Contrast this with the People’s Republic of China which has been an increasingly eager creditor of the Sri Lankan Governments since the mid 2000s,” Power said.
“Indeed, over the past two decades, China became one of Sri Lanka’s biggest creditors offering often opaque loan deals at higher interest rates than other lenders and financing a raft of headline grabbing infrastructure projects with often questionable practical use for Sri Lankans, including a massive port that generated little income and was barely used by ships,” she said in an apparent reference to the Hambanthota port.