Marked increase in Japanese investments

Economic and political relations between Japan and Sri Lanka improved markedly in recent years with more Japanese investments coming to the country, including a plant to make solar panels, Sri Lanka’s ambassador in Japan, Admiral (Rtd) Wasantha Karannagoda said. Major Japanese companies like Marubeni, Sumitomo, Sagawa and Kajima Corporation will set up trading activities and joint ventures or are already working in Sri Lanka, he said.

Karannagoda said Bansei Securities, a leading Japanese company, invested yen 10 billion ( about US$125 million) in Sri Lanka Treasury Bonds.

Zuc International is setting up a factory in Mirigama opening in March 2013 to make solar panels and set up a 10MW power plant with an investment of nearly US$50 million, Karannagoda said.

“Japan is helping us in the international fora to keep Western pressure off.

“One reason is the way we helped them during the tsunami of March 2011 when nearly half-a-million foreign expatriates working in Japan left the country along with over 6,000 foreign students. This was the time 32 ambassadors left Tokyo, which left a sense of abandonment in the minds of the Japanese people. This was around the time I came as ambassador to Japan and I went to the disaster-struck areas with embassy staff and Sri Lankan people. We camped out in those areas and distributed food. We distributed three million bags of tea sent by President Mahinda Rajapaksa and got down a Sri Lankan Army team whose work was so appreciated that they stayed on for an additional week,” he said.

“Japan appreciates the solidarity shown by Sri Lanka.

I believe the Japanese government’s subsequent gestures are a result of that.

It will certainly benefit Sri Lanka if we maintain this relationship,” Karannagoda said during a Sri Lanka Festival in Tokyo recently.

He said in March 2012, when most Western countries were criticising Sri Lanka on Human Rights issues at the United Nations Human Rights Council sessions, Japan issued a strong statement in support of Sri Lanka, noting that emerging countries all have Human Rights issues and that Sri Lanka must not be singled out and instead must be helped.