'India out' as China moves in on Maldives
As China gains ground in the Maldives, bilateral ties between New Delhi and Male have deteriorated fast.
Expert analysis:
India has started pulling out its military personnel from the Maldives.
The move comes amid an intense diplomatic row
While claiming that he is committed to protecting the sovereignty
The Indian Ocean’s ‘tollgate’
The Indian Ocean contains some of the most important chokepoints for maritime trade: the Strait of Hormuz, Bal-el-Mandeb, Straits of Malacca and the Mozambique Channel.?
It is a critical route for energy supplies for China and India both as well as for their engagement with Africa, West Asia and the island nations and littoral states across the Indian Ocean.
Many island and littoral nations in India’s backyard like the Maldives tend to play off China against Indian influence to gain foreign policy manoeuvrability
Shifting allegiances
For the first four decades since its independence in 1965, the Maldives was firmly under Indian influence.
India supported strongman Maumoon Abdul Gayoom as president from 1978 to 2008, going so far as to send in its armed forces in 1978 to help Gayoom suppress a coup engineered by his opponents.
India was also at hand for assistance to the Maldives ranging from trade cooperation, natural disaster relief
Then in 2013, just when China was laying the groundwork for its Belt and Road Initiative, authoritarian pro-China president Abdulla Yameen was elected to power.
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He invited Chinese assistance for infrastructure projects in the Maldives – a new runway for the main international airport, a bridge between capital Male and the island of Hulhumale – and even signed a free trade agreement with Beijing.
As a result, the Maldives accumulated nearly USD$ 1.5 billion of Chinese debt by 2018, a large sum considering that its GDP is less than USD$ 9 billion.
Democracy was restored with the election of Ibrahim Solih in 2018 and India was on top again.
Solih pulled out of the FTA with China with India providing USD$1.4 billion for loan paybacks and other development assistance.
And now, under President Muizzu, the tables have once again turned again in favour of China.?
Deepening US-China rivalry – especially the Chinese forays into the western reaches of the Indo-Pacific and opening up of a military base at Djibouti – has pushed Washington to recognise the geostrategic importance of the Maldives.
It will be interesting to see how India-China and US-China geostrategic competition unfolds. What is clear, however, is that things are likely to get much worse for India in the Maldives as Male and Beijing expand and deepen their strategic partnership.
By Bharat Bhushan, 360info
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