Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang called on President
Mahinda Rajapaksa this morning at the President’s House. Mr. Dejiang arrived inSri Lankaon Friday morning on a three-day official visit.
China and
Sri Lanka Sri Lanka and Chinasigned six agreements to enhance co-operation in the fields of technology,
industry, information technology and construction at the Prime Minister’s
Office yesterday. The signing of these agreements took place in the presence of
Prime Minister D.M. Jayaratne and Chinese Vice Premier Zhang
Dejiang.
China has
offered financial assistance of US$ 200 million to build the second phase of
the Hambantota Port. The first phase of this deep sea
port is under construction also with Chinese assistance and is expected to be
commissioned for operation in the last quarter of the year.
China is
one of the major development partners of Sri Lanka and among the other major
development projects underway with Chinese assistance are the Colombo-Katunayake
expressway project, Norochcholai power plant, tank farm project at Hambantota,
and the road infrastructure project.
Since 2006, the Chinese government has provided Sri Lanka with
US $ 3.06 billion financial assistance, of which US $ 35.77 million as grants. - (Govt. Info. Dept)
