A Ringside Seat

Hugo Swire, our Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, visited Sri Lanka last week. It’s always good to get in early, and his was the first bilateral visit to the new Government of Sri Lanka.

It was an exciting opportunity for my Government to congratulate President Sirisena and Prime Minister Wickremasinghe face to face, and to share ideas about expanding our partnership. It got fantastic press coverage.  Accompanying Mr Swire in his meetings with the President, Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, as well as Ministers for Resettlement and Investment, I had a real ringside seat. This blog is a personal account of what happened and why the visit mattered.

Discussions covered every aspect of our relationship, including trade, tourism, human rights, the UN, the Indian Ocean and the Commonwealth. Mr Swire heard many commitments to democracy and good governance. He welcomed these and offered UK support. There is so much potential for working more closely together in the next few years.

Mr Swire spent a whole day in Jaffna and the North, tracing the steps of Prime Minister David Cameron, who was of course the first Head of Government to visit Jaffna in many years when he travelled there during the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2013. As well as Chief Minister Wigneswaram and leaders of the Tamil National Alliance, Mr Swire met journalists, English language students and some of the internally displaced. He also gave Jaffa library some of the accountancy and children’s books they had asked for, travelled to Elephant Pass and watched the UK funded HALO trust team at work in Muhamalai, Sri Lanka’s single biggest remaining minefield. HALO have found nearly 12,000 mines in Muhamalai, including, just a few weeks ago, a store of 500 anti-personnel mines buried in sacks.

We talk about reconciliation, political settlement, accountability all the time. It’s visits like these that give real meaning to those terms: understanding the difficulties of day to day life, giving shoes to children who have difficulty travelling to their schools, witnessing the bravery of the de-mining teams who are making it possible for land to be returned to productive use.  We put our money where our mouth is too, spending over £5 million on de-mining in Sri Lanka, and a further £2 million next year alone to support reconciliation and reform.

The UK-Sri Lanka relationship is a lot more than just politics, and the visit was also about prosperity: business and education. Sri Lanka has enjoyed the strongest average growth of any country in South Asia, and outstrips its regional rivals in terms of ease of doing business. That makes it a very attractive destination for British Business, and the Council for Business with Britain boasts almost 150 members. Several investors and company chiefs enjoyed the opportunity to tell the Minister about their plans – and their frustrations. We’re looking forward to working with the Government to tackle corruption, such a big blocker to investment and growth.

Mr Swire particularly enjoyed meeting a wide range of young professionals too, including some of our fantastic Chevening alumni and students studying five different design degrees from Northumbria University at the Academy of Design, run by British Council Young Creative Entrepreneur Fashion Award winner Linda Speldwinde.  A huge part of our relationship with Sri Lanka is education, with 28 UK universities now offering qualifications here.

And finally, Ministerial visits aren’t just good for the bilateral relationship. It was also a big fillip to show Mr Swire how we are improving our office space and to have him hand over awards to some of the High Commission’s exceptional staff.