EAM Jaishankar’s Sri Lanka visit likely to give impetus to ECT project

New Delhi: External affairs minister S Jaishankar’s three-day Sri Lanka visit, which began on Tuesday, will give impetus to the much-delayed Colombo port’s Eastern Container Terminal (ECT) project.

Jaishankar’s visit and his meetings may also add momentum to negotiations for another $1-billion currency swap arrangement. New Delhi and Colombo are also discussing a deal to allow Sri Lanka to delay repayment of debt to India, ET has learnt.

Last July, India extended a $400-million currency swap facility to Sri Lanka to help its economy recover from the Covid-19 crisis. Lanka is also expecting a $1.5-billion currency swap facility from China.


ECT is one of the deep sea-ports at the Port of Colombo (PoC) and adjacent to the Colombo International Container Terminals run by China. The port workers have been applying continuous pressure on the Lankan government not to award ECT to India and to stay away from geopolitics. But critics allege that China is backing the protests.

Lankan Cabinet memorandum of October 22, 2020, stated that “it has been decided to award ECT to Adani Group and Japan in a joint venture”. But fresh protests have not allowed commencement of work, ET has learnt.

Currently, 80% of transhipment cargo at PoC is from India. Colombo-based sources told ET that the port workers’ didn’t protest when the Chinese were offered mega projects and there were no proper environmental impact assessments to the $1.4-billion port city project.

Former Sri Lankan Central Bank deputy governor WA Wijewardena recently told a newspaper in Colombo that there are difficulties with Chinese projects, compared to those funded by the Asian Development Bank or World Bank. Most of the Chinese funded projects do not earn enough to repay loans and profit from other sources have to be used for repaying these loans.