Ahead of India Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Sri Lanka on Friday, Indian Foreign Secretary S. Jaishankar announced New Delhi’s cooperation with Sri Lanka’s new government on the repatriation of 100,000 Tamils currently residing in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.
Beijing’s announcement on Thursday of a 10 percent increase in military spending, to $145 billion, marks the fifth consecutive year of double-digit increases, and is not without significant repercussions in Asia.
In his first foreign trip since assuming power, Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena will visit India on Feb. 16 for two days, hailing a potential warming of relations between the two countries.
Before Narendra Modi became the prime minister of India, some observers in China believed that he could well be “the Deng Xiaoping of India,” comparing him with the Chinese leader who led the economic reform that has transformed China to a global power from a Third World country.
Following the withdrawal of support on Sunday from the Muslim Congress, Sri Lanka’s largest Muslim political party, Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s bid for a third term in office on Jan. 8 looks increasingly shaky.