Going Global

Sri Lanka will not accept any conditions on a loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the island's president has said.

"We will not pawn or sell our motherland to obtain any monetary aid," said Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The Sri Lankan government is in talks with the IMF about a $1.9bn (£1.4bn) loan to help combat the economic downturn and pay for reconstruction.

The IMF usually insists on conditions for any emergency loans.

No forced measures

These involve taking steps such as cutting public spending or raising interest rates.

But Sri Lanka has made it clear.... (more at BBC)


Hmmm.. no  I have not got many thoughts there. As of late the West seems to have simpered a bit to the war efforts and have indicated a lot more support than they used to. With Hillary Clinton's call to the president and her supposed 'support extended with regard to the 'humanitarian improvements' and the elimination of terrorism etc. I still have the Derana News Alert on my phone.

Except she didn't. Well she did call him but internet news reports seem to deny the fact that she had anything good to say, while some others agree a little more with the Temple Trees version of the tale. This phone conversation and what was really said and implied could play a big role on our future relations with the West and entities such as the IMF and World Bank.

SL is very much an import dependent economy for many of its basic essentials and therefore foreign help in terms of loans, exports tariffs, trade deals etc are essential to its survival. And these rarely come completely devoid of conditions. It seems in a polarized world, the only way to maintain true independence is to have a completely closed economy or be the strongest player around. Since we're nothing of either, it looks as if we will have to go through some changes based on the whims of others soon enough.

But obviously, the government will not make it look like they were 'conditions' when they implement them in the economy oh no. And since we seem to have pretty much of a dormant opposition it looks like the real news of what is going to happen in the in the future may not be too clear till months later. By which time it'll be too late to do anything about it. Not that anything much could be done about it anyway. But at least we'll know.