Malaysian High Commissioner in Colombo Tan Yang Thai meeting on Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena at the Foreign Ministry last week (11).

Malaysian High Commissioner in Colombo Tan Yang Thai has commended policies implemented by Sri Lanka to tackle the spread of the virus.

The envoy commended Sri Lanka’s strategies to fight against the pandemic when he called on Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena at the Foreign Ministry last week (11), the Foreign Ministry said yesterday.

It said: Discussions between the two dignitaries focused on enhancing bilateral cooperation in trade and security between the two countries.

The High Commissioner while commenting that all countries were struggling to stay afloat amidst the raging COVID-19 virus which continued to claim heavy toll on their economies, commended policies implemented by Sri Lanka to tackle the spread of the virus. 

High Commissioner Tan Yang Thai also noted that Malaysia would continue to support the ASEAN centrality and the recently signed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) expected to facilitate the Southeast Asian economies to return to normalcy overcoming the contagion in the post COVID-19 era. The RCEP would connect about 30% of the world’s people and generate significant gains, particularly in Southeast Asia by 2030 and improve access to Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) opening up opportunities for market access in areas of transport, energy, and communications.

Foreign Minister Dinesh Gunawardena expressing his sincere wishes to the Foreign Minister of Malaysia, said that he was optimistic that Sri Lanka and Malaysia could gear up its cooperation in multifarious fields at the beginning of next year by holding bilateral political consultations. Both dignitaries agreed that there was immense potential for Sri Lanka to expand trade with Malaysia, particularly in agriculture based industries.    

Minister Gunawardena commended the cooperation extended by Malaysia in security-related fields and both endorsed closer cooperation. High Commissioner Tan underlined that Malaysia would not condone any type of terrorism or extremism in Malaysia, and would take every measure to curtail and would continue to promote peace and stability in the region. Furthermore, the Malaysian High Commissioner assured that Malaysia would continue to support Sri Lanka in the regional and International fora. Minister Gunawardena reiterated that Sri Lanka expected to build a strong bond with the ASEAN community during his tenure and highlighted that Sri Lanka expected to become a Sectoral Dialogue Partner of ASEAN. 

The trade between Sri Lanka and Malaysia has been increasing over the last few years with the emergence of Malaysia as one of Sri Lanka’s major trading partners. At present, Malaysia is the 4th supplier to Sri Lanka in 2019 supplying 4.6% of Sri Lanka’s total imports. Malaysia was the 39th export destination of Sri Lanka in 2019. Malaysia was also the 6th investing partner of Sri Lanka in the year of 2019.