{"id":66020,"date":"2017-05-11T14:48:26","date_gmt":"2017-05-11T21:48:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=66020"},"modified":"2017-05-11T14:48:26","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T21:48:26","slug":"sri-lanka-rejects-china-sub-visit-after-india-protest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2017\/05\/11\/sri-lanka-rejects-china-sub-visit-after-india-protest\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka rejects China sub visit after India protest"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><em><strong>Courtesy Presstv<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><strong>Sri Lanka refused permission for a Chinese submarine to dock at Colombo next week after a similar visit in 2014 angered regional superpower India, a top defense official said Thursday.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Chinese authorities had sought clearance for a port call at\u00a0Colombo where a Chinese state-owned company operates a mega container terminal, the official said asking not to be named.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They have asked for permission, but we have said no,&#8221; the official told AFP. &#8220;It is a very sensitive matter.&#8221; He did not elaborate.<\/p>\n<p>The rejection came as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was visiting Sri Lanka as chief guest of Vesak, the island&#8217;s main Buddhist celebration.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/217.218.67.233\/\/photo\/20170511\/efede067-2935-41b3-9b86-ed79de9b6ae7.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"555\" height=\"313\" \/><figcaption>Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi (R) shakes hands with Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe prior to a meeting in New Delhi on April 26, 2017. (Photo by AFP)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>The request for the Chinese submarine visit was for next week, after Modi&#8217;s departure on Friday evening, official sources said.<\/p>\n<p>There was no immediate comment from the Chinese embassy in Colombo, but two submarine calls at the Colombo harbor in 2014 had reportedly angered India which considered them\u00a0as undermining its\u00a0security.<\/p>\n<p>New Delhi traditionally regards its smaller neighbor as being within its sphere of influence. New Delhi is said to have been worried about Beijing&#8217;s growing influence on Colombo under the former regime of strongman president Mahinda Rajapakse.<\/p>\n<p>Sri Lanka&#8217;s new President Maithripala Sirisena came to power in January 2015 promising to loosen ties with China after a decade of hefty funding by Beijing under his predecessor.<\/p>\n<p>However, analysts have noted that Beijing&#8217;s influence was on the rise again as Colombo struggles to find alternative sources of much needed foreign capital.<\/p>\n<p>(Source: AFP)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Courtesy Presstv Sri Lanka refused permission for a Chinese submarine to dock at Colombo next week after a similar visit in 2014 angered regional superpower India, a top defense official said Thursday. Chinese authorities had sought clearance for a port call at\u00a0Colombo where a Chinese state-owned company operates a mega container terminal, the official said [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66020\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}