Tag: economic pakages

As negotiators from the International fund try and talk of a bailout for the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka at talks in Washington, they’ll little doubt press the requirement for stringent economic reforms. Any such rescue action will ultimately fail unless political changes are made, too. Politics helped create the country’s current crisis. An earlier government led by then-president Mahinda Rajapaksa borrowed heavily from China et al. to finance ambitious infrastructure projects, saddling states with unsustainable debts. His brother, former defence secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa, then swept to power in 2019 and packed the govt. With cronies and relatives, including Mahinda Rajapaksa as prime minister and another brother as minister. In the subsequent year, the preside...