A Chinese surveillance vessel docked at a port in Sri Lanka on Tuesday, raising tensions between neighboring India and China as Indian leaders grow increasingly alarmed by Beijing's expanding influence in the region, the New York Times reported.
The vessel, from a line of Yuan Wang ships that China's military uses to track satellite and ballistic-missile launches, is scheduled to remain for several days of refueling at the southern Hambantota port. China holds a 99-year lease on the port after Sri Lanka failed to pay back Chinese loans to build it.
Officials from India and the United States, two members of an alliance known as the Quad that is aimed at checking China's rising influence in the region, had raised their concerns both in Colombo, the Sri Lankan capital, and in Cambodia during recent ministerial meetings of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Sri Lankan officials told The New York Times.
A Sri Lankan government minister said the island nation was working to ensure there was no friction between friendly countries. "India had raised concerns and Sri Lanka requested a delay in the ship's docking until discussions could be had to resolve these issues," Media Minister Bandula Gunawardana told reporters. "Even before this there have been ships from the U.S., India and other countries coming to Sri Lanka. We have allowed these ships to come. In the same way we have allowed the Chinese ship to dock."
"Sri Lanka's proximity to India means that China's dealings with the island often come under close scrutiny," the NYT quoted Lyle Goldstein, an expert on China's military and director of Asia engagement at Defense Priorities, as saying. "There has been over a decade of speculation about whether Beijing would seek to make its port facility at Hambantota into a naval base." Mr. Goldstein said that while India would be worried about China's gradually increasing presence, the Yuan Wang 5, the space-tracking vessel, would be less threatening to India than the visits by Chinese submarines in the past that India strongly objected to.
China says the ship is used for scientific research, but the US Defense Department says the ship is under the command of the People's Liberation Army (PLA) and is capable of tracking satellites and missile launches. However, according to a US Defense Department report published last year, the vessel is under the command of the PLA's Strategic Support Force (SSF), "a theater command-level organization established to centralize the PLA's strategic space, cyber, electronic, information, communications, and psychological warfare missions and capabilities... The SSF also operates Yuan Wang space support ships that track satellite and intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launches," the US report said, according to MSN.
The ship's arrival at the Hambantota port was always going to be controversial - China leased the port from Sri Lanka in 2017 for 99 years after Colombo failed to pay debts related to the construction of the facility, according to MSN. At the time, the deal raised concerns that it would give China access to a key shipping route, putting it within India's traditional sphere of influence. And the presence of a ship packed with advanced technology has made Sri Lanka's neighbors nervous.
Carl Schuster, a former US Navy captain and former director of operations at the US Pacific Command's Joint Intelligence Center, was quoted by MSN as saying that New Delhi's concern about the ship's presence in Sri Lanka was likely due to its monitoring capabilities. "Spying is not her primary mission... her primary mission is satellite tracking and monitoring PRC rocket launches, telemetry, and satellite status... but that same capability can and often is employed to monitor other countries' satellite operations, downlinks and missile telemetry," he said.
