At an “Invest Maldives” forum in a southern Chinese port city, the Maldivian president shook hands and exchanged words with smiling local officials on a China visit set to deepen bilateral ties as the nation pirouettes away from India.
After the forum in Fuzhou yesterday, Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu and his delegation were to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Premier Li Qiang (李強) in Beijing during his week-long visit, where pacts from infrastructure to tourism are expected to be signed.
Muizzu became president in November last year after winning on his “India Out” campaign platform under which he called New Delhi’s huge influence a threat to sovereignty. His government has since asked dozens of locally based Indian military personnel to leave and in an apparent snub to India, Muizzu is in China this week, before any visit to his nation’s giant neighbor.
Photo: Reuters
In Fuzhou, the Chinese city designated as the start of China’s maritime “Silk Road,” Muizzu said China remained one of his nation’s “closest allies and developmental partners,” a statement released by his office said.
Increasing export of fish products to China under the two nations’ free-trade agreement would be a key priority, Muizzu added.
Fishing is the largest source of employment in the Maldives, where 99 percent of its territory comprises the sea. Aquatic products account for more than 98 percent of exports by volume and value.
China has already built a presence for itself in the Maldives. Under Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative aimed at building a global trade and infrastructure network, China has helped expand Velana International Airport in Male and built the cross-sea China-Maldives Friendship Bridge.
Muizzu said his government was keen to explore partnerships under the Belt and Road Initiative, including the expansion of the nation’s central airport and commercial port.
Chinese firms have invested US$1.37 billion in the Maldives since its decision to join the initiative in 2014, American Enterprise Institute think tank data shows.
China National Machinery Industry Corp last year invested US$140 million in the Maldives’ tourism sector, which accounts for more than one-quarter of the nation’s national income.
Chinese tourists in 2019 accounted for 19.7 percent of foreign visitors, making them the biggest tourist group, although they slipped to third position by 2022 during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Maldives is also a popular destination among Indian nationals, whose presence has grown more prominent in the three years when China’s austere pandemic restrictions kept Chinese visitors away.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week was snorkeling in Lakshadweep, an archipelago of atolls and reefs off the coast of Kerala, a visit that some viewed as an attempt to draw tourists away from the nearby Maldives.
“India’s strained relations with certain countries in South Asia can be attributed to its perception of being the regional boss,” China’s Global Times reported on Monday, citing analysts.
Quoting a Chinese academic, it said India’s current “nervousness” about Muizzu’s visit to China showed its “lack of confidence.”
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
CONFIDENT ON DEAL: ‘Ukraine wants a seat at the table, but wouldn’t the people of Ukraine have a say? It’s been a long time since an election, the US president said US President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and added that he was more confident of a deal to end the war after US-Russia talks. Trump increased pressure on Zelenskiy to hold elections and chided him for complaining about being frozen out of talks in Saudi Arabia. The US president also suggested that he could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin before the end of the month as Washington overhauls its stance toward Russia. “I’m very disappointed, I hear that they’re upset about not having a seat,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida when asked about the Ukrainian
RSS