Xi Jinping says improving China-Lanka ties have his 'high attention'

India has expressed reservations over MSR as it has security implications for it in Indian Ocean. MSR is part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)

Chinese President Xi Jinping today said he pays "high attention" to strengthening strategic ties with Sri Lanka, as Beijing beefed up plans to build a Maritime Silk Road project in India's backyard -- the Indian Ocean.

In a message to congratulate Sri Lanka on its 70th anniversary of Independence from British rule, Xi told his counterpart Maithripala Sirisena that China is willing to work with it for better development of strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries.

"I pay high attention to the development of China-Sri Lanka relations, and I am willing to make concerted efforts with President Sirisena to push the China-Sri Lanka strategic cooperative partnership of sincere mutual assistance and long-standing friendship to keep achieving greater development in the better interest of the two countries and its people," he said.

Xi also said that China and Sri Lanka have achieved "fruitful results" by their display of "pragmatic cooperation" within the framework of the joint construction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road (MSR).

India has expressed reservations over MSR as it has security implications for it in Indian Ocean. MSR is part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Proposed by China in 2013, the BRI aims to build trade and infrastructure networks connecting Asia with Europe and Africa based on ancient land and maritime trade routes enhancing China's global influence.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang too congratulated his Sri Lankan counterpart Ranil Wickramasinghe on the occasion.