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Chinese President Xi Jinping and Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu attend a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China January 10, 2024.
Maldives vote moves it closer to China
On Sunday, the South Asian archipelago of the Maldives held parliamentary elections, widely viewed as a referendum on the pro-China policies of President Mohamed Muizzu. Preliminary returns have Muizzu’s People’s National Congress Party leading with 66 of 93 seats up for grabs (with 86 declared), with 73% of 284,000 eligible voters casting ballots.
India out, China in. Muizzu came to power last September on an “India Out” campaign, repudiating his country’s historical ties to New Delhi in favor of closer links with Beijing. Since then, Muizzu ordered the expulsion of Indian military personnel and awarded significant infrastructure projects to Chinese companies. Earlier this year, Muizzu traveled to China to strike a deal that boosted Chinese tourism by 200%, in the wake of a 40% drop in Indian tourism caused by derogatory remarks made by Maldivian deputy ministers about Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Muizzu was considered a proxy candidate for former President Abdulla Yameen, who held power between 2013 and 2018 and whose 11-year jail term on bribery charges was overturned last week. Under Yameen, the Maldives joined China’s Belt and Road Initiative in 2013. Both India and China view the Maldives as a strategic maritime hub in the Indian Ocean due to its location on major east-west international shipping routes.
Lakshadweep, Jan 4 (ANI): Prime Minister Narendra Modi tries snorkelling on one of the pristine beaches, in Lakshadweep on Thursday. (ANI Photo)No Use India.
Modi and the Maldives “beach off”
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s new job is beach, and the Maldives aren’t having it.
In an attempt to boost tourism to Indian beaches, Modi posted some snaps of himself enjoying a vacation on Lakshadweep, an island chain in the Indian Ocean. Seventy nautical miles to the South, the Maldives – where Indian tourists comprise up to 11% of tourism revenue – took great offense, calling Modi ” a “terrorist” and a “puppet of Israel.”
A #boycottmaldives campaign flared up in response, with Modi’s cult following posting screenshots of their canceled trips to the island nation. Meanwhile, government officials, Bollywood stars, and cricketers have urged Indians to join Modi for a snorkel (with a life jacket on, of course) in Lakshadweep.
The Barbie-worthy “beach off” comes at a contentious time. The two nations are strategic allies, but their relationship is strained by the new pro-China Maldivian President Mohamed Muizzu tilting the country away from New Delhi and toward Beijing.Polish truckers block several border crossings with Ukraine in protest at what they say is Ukrainian haulers' free rein in Poland that is hurting their business.
Hard Numbers: Truck backup at Polish border, Maldives says bye to India’s troops, Australia clinches Cricket World Cup, Swift postpones Rio show amid deadly heat
3,000: For the past 11 days, Polish truckers have blocked roads leading to three border crossings with Ukraine, protesting what they call “government inaction” over a loss of business to foreign competitors since Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Traffic is now backed up 30 kilometers on one of the routes, with an estimated 3,000 trucks waiting to cross.
75: The recently elected president of the Maldives, Mohamed Muizzu, formally asked India to withdraw its 75-person military contingent from the country. Muizzu won the presidential election in September on an “India Out platform” and is seen as more closely aligned with China.
6: On Sunday, Australia won a record-extending sixth Cricket World Cup against India with a six-wicket victory at Narendra Modi Stadium. Despite starting the tournament sidelined by a broken left hand, Australian player Travis Head scored 137 runs and was named man of the match, becoming only the seventh player to score a century in a men's World Cup final.
140: On Saturday, megastar Taylor Swift postponed her second concert in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, after a 23-year-old woman died at her Friday show, apparently due to the sweltering combination of temperature and humidity, which felt like 140 degrees Fahrenheit, the highest index Rio has ever recorded. In a handwritten note shared on her social media, Swift said she had a “shattered heart.” “There's very little information I have other than the fact that she was so incredibly beautiful and far too young,” she wrote.
The president-elect of the Maldives, Mohamed Muizzu, left, and SMER-SSD party leader Robert Fico, right.
Election update: China champion takes Maldives, Russia scores in Slovakia
Indeed, Muizzu, mayor of the capital city of Male, campaigned on the slogan “India out.” He previously served as the construction minister in the pro-China government of Abdulla Yameen, who is now jailed on corruption charges. Under Yameen, the Maldives secured several Chinese-funded infrastructure projects, including a $200 million bridge connecting Male to the airport, and joined China’s Belt and Road Initiative. In an online meeting with Chinese Communist Party officials last year, Muizzu pledged that his party’s return to power would grow the “strong ties between our two countries.”
China wants to leverage the strategic location of the Maldives and safeguard the passage of its energy supplies through the area from the Gulf states. But India’s influence may not be that easy to uproot, and there are concerns that too close an alliance with China could tip the Maldives into the “Chinese debt trap,” a fate that has befallen other small nations.
Meanwhile, in Slovakia, the Kremlin-friendly SMER party, led by Robert Fico, performed better than expected, garnering 22.9% of the popular vote and topping the pro-Ukrainian Progressive Slovakia party’s 17.9%. Fico is a former two-term prime minister who was forced to resign in 2018 after the murder of a journalist who had been exposing corruption allegations against the government. Now, Fico is expected to assemble a coalition with the moderate-left Hlas party, an offshoot of SMER, and the nationalist, pro-Russian Slovak National Party.
SMER’s victory spells trouble for NATO: Fico promises to immediately cease providing military support to Ukraine and withdraw Slovakia’s previous support for Ukraine’s NATO membership. His win could also prove problematic for the EU as Fico is an ally of Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orbán, who gleefully posted on X, “Guess who’s back! Always good to work together with a patriot.” If Poland’s governing Law & Justice party wins a third term in the country’s Oct. 15 election, this trend of illiberal, Brussels skepticism will be further strengthened.An aerial view of Maldives capital Male December 9, 2009.
China vs. India in the Maldives
Most of the world thinks of the Maldives as either a dream vacation spot or one of the first countries likely to slip beneath the waves as climate change raises sea levels.
But the governments of China and India think of the Maldives as a strategic prize in their intensifying competition with one another.
That’s because this nation of 520,000 people spread across nearly 1,200 coral islands spanning 35,000 square miles of the Indian Ocean straddles East-West shipping lines of vital interest to both countries.
On Saturday, voters in the Maldives will head to the polls for a second-round presidential runoff featuring President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, who has favored closer ties with India, and opposition candidate Mohamed Muizzu, who argues for better ties with China. Both countries have invested hundreds of millions in infrastructure projects across the archipelago nation in hopes of boosting their influence with its government.
This weekend’s election is just the latest chapter in a long-running story of great-power competition.
Both candidates say they favor good relations with both giant neighbors, but Muizzu has scored political points by accusing Solih of inviting Indian forces onto Maldives territory. For now, Muizzu is favored to win.
A tourist floats in front of huts at a resort island at the Male Atoll
The floating city of the future
There are two ways to protect the planet from climate change: Slow the heating of the planet or adapt to changing climate conditions. There is now a near-universal consensus that the world’s governments must invest in both strategies.
But climate change poses special problems for the Maldives, an archipelago nation of about 520,000 people who are scattered across more than 1,000 islands. Some 80% of Maldivian territory already sits below sea level. In the capital city of Malé, some 200,000 people live in an area of just 8 square kilometers at an average elevation of less than eight feet above sea level.
For people who live in a nation that will slip beneath the waves in the coming decades, the need for creative, innovative approaches to climate adaptation is an increasingly easy sell.
That’s why the Maldives government is now partnering with a Netherlands-based real estate developer to design a floating city, one that can provide homes, schools, hospitals, stores, restaurants, and other necessities of life for 20,000 people in the Indian Ocean.
Construction is already underway and on schedule. We’ll be watching to see if engineers learn new lessons that boost adaptation strategies on an even larger scale in other parts of the world.
US's Pompeo to visit Sri Lanka and Maldives as China threat looms
COLOMBO/MALE (REUTERS) - US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will visit Sri Lanka and the Maldives this month, officials of both Indian Ocean nations said on Tuesday (Oct 20), as Washington seeks to counter China's growing influence in the region.
Maldives detains migrant workers seeking unpaid wages: HRW
MALÉ (AFP) - Human Rights Watch on Saturday (July 25) urged the Maldives to drop charges against 80 migrant workers arrested for demanding their unpaid wages in a country otherwise known for its upmarket tourism.