{"id":6237,"date":"2025-01-24T17:50:08","date_gmt":"2025-01-24T17:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/?p=6237"},"modified":"2025-01-24T17:50:27","modified_gmt":"2025-01-24T17:50:27","slug":"sri-lanka-agrees-with-chinas-sinopec-to-fast-track-3-7-billion-refinery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/2025\/01\/24\/sri-lanka-agrees-with-chinas-sinopec-to-fast-track-3-7-billion-refinery\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka agrees with China’s Sinopec to fast-track $3.7 billion refinery"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Link to article: https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/asia-pacific\/sri-lanka-china-agree-fast-track-sinopecs-37-bln-refinery-hambantota-2025-01-22\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath announced on Wednesday, January 22, that the country has signed an agreement with Sinopec, a Chinese petroleum refining corporation, to fast-track a $3.7 billion oil refinery in Hambantota, a port city in the south of the island nation. They are still discussing how much will be exported from the facility and how much will remain in the country. Herath felt it was one of the largest and most important foreign investment projects the country has ever received and is excited to break ground. This comes a week after a meeting between newly-elected Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing where the two signed 15 cooperation documents about topics regarding economic and technological development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is huge for Sri Lanka. They heavily rely on imported oil, so a big project like this is extremely valuable for them, especially after their foreign exchange crisis in 2022 which destroyed their economy. It seems like they’ve been getting pretty buddy-buddy with China since then. China probably saw a struggling Asian country and saw an opportunity to spread its influence. They also probably see it as a way to get even closer to India, who is a regional rival and threat to regional hegemony, and create more competition. Usually, I’m very critical of these foreign relations guys, but this deal makes sense for Sri Lanka. While I’d advise against dealing with China, I’m an American and automatically have a bad view of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This relates to class because it is a result of geopolitics. Sri Lanka is in a disadvantageous spot for oil, so they discussed with China to overcome their geography and get an oil refinery built. They also saw this as a lucrative business opportunity, as they were considering exporting some of this refined oil. China sees this as a way to further exert influence in South Asia and over India. As a result, India could feel like this is a security risk. China is inching closer with its influence and might try something funny in India soon. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Link to article: https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/world\/asia-pacific\/sri-lanka-china-agree-fast-track-sinopecs-37-bln-refinery-hambantota-2025-01-22\/ Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath announced on Wednesday, January 22, that the country has signed an agreement with Sinopec, a Chinese petroleum refining corporation, to fast-track a $3.7 billion oil refinery in Hambantota, a port city in the south of the island nation. They are still discussing how much will be exported from the facility… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":309,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-analysis-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6237","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/309"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6237"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6237\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6257,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6237\/revisions\/6257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6237"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6237"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/southandcentralasiablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6237"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}