By Rathindra Kuruwita

Chinese research vessel Shi Yan 6 would arrive in Sri Lanka in late November, Foreign Minister Mohamed Ali Sabry said on Monday (09). The Foreign Ministry had granted approval for the arrival of the ship, he added.

“The ship is expected to arrive in Sri Lanka on 25 November. Initially, they wanted to come in October. We asked them to come in November. They again asked if they could come in late October. We have maintained our position that they must come in late November. This is the situation, now.”

The Minister said that the Sri Lankan government had a lot on its hands now and that it needed to marshal all its resources to deal with the sensitive issues pertaining to the Chinese ship visit.

“We held an international conference of environmental ministers last week. We will have an IORA meeting this week, and we have to accommodate representatives of 34 countries. President Ranil Wickremesinghe will go to China next week. Then a French delegation will be here. We have requested the Chinese to come thereafter,” the Foreign Minister said, adding that there was a lot of pressure from India and several other parties.

“We can’t deny there is pressure from multiple sides. This is a complex matter, given geopolitics. There will be controversies within and outside Sri Lanka. We need to be ready to deal with these pressures. We need to have all the resources at our disposal.”

Minister Sabry said there is a struggle among major powers. Sri Lanka sits at a strategic location in the Indian Ocean.

“We need to balance everything. This is not easy. We need to maintain good relations with everyone involved.”

China has been a friend of Sri Lanka, and relations with the middle kingdom are extremely important to Sri Lanka, Minister Sabry said.

“We have not changed our stance. We have given them a date.”

India views the arrival of Chinese ships from a different angle, he said.

“Prime Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike before the the UN General Assembly, in 1964, said that the Indian Ocean and the skies above it would be declared a Zone of Peace. This is what we want. We won’t do anything that violates the peace in the Indian Ocean. We have tough choices, and we have to make the best decisions for the country.”

Minister Sabry said that as a sovereign nation, Sri Lanka could decide whether to allow a vessel to enter one of its ports, and discussions with the Chinese were based on that.

The Minister, however, refused to divulge whether Indian officials had directly reached out to him and expressed disapproval for allowing the Chinese research vessel to arrive.

“We can’t reveal everything. China is a close friend. We have repeatedly said we will not discriminate against China for any reason. India is also important to us. They helped us greatly last year. The West is also important to us because 80 percent of our exports go there. I don’t make decisions on my own. We all talk and decide what the best course of action is.”

Minister Sabry also said that the Foreign Ministry has not in any way influenced academics from Ruhuna University to be involved with Shi Yan 6. Initially, it was reported that academics from Ruhuna University would board the ship. However, last week, Prof. Disna Ratnasekera of the China Sri Lanka Joint Centre for Education and Research (CSL-CER) of the University of Ruhuna told the media that they were not involved with the research carried out by the vessel.

“We have not told the university anything. The decision was probably taken by the university,” he said

However, the National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency (NARA) Chairman Prof. Jayantha Wijeyaratne said NARA was involved in the research carried out by the ship and that geophysical and seismic survey vessel Shi Yan 6 would be in the possession of NARA and that those data will be considered property of the Sri Lankan government. Prof. Wijeyaratne said NARA would mainly focus on research related to the quality of water, not the seabed.

Minister Sabry added that Victoria Nuland, Acting United States Deputy Secretary of State, had not informed him that the US was disappointed that Sri Lanka had granted permission for the Chinese research vessel to come.

“China, India, and the US have a big power rivalry going. There are a lot of suspicions. They worry that other countries are collecting information about them. We don’t want to get involved with any of this.”