Maldives to work "very closely" with China to overcome Covid-19's economic challenges

Maldives and China have held discussions on economic recovery and development cooperation.

The discussions were held during a meeting between Foreign Minister Abdulla Shahid and Chinese Ambassador to Maldives, Zhang Lizhong as well as Finance Minister Ibrahim Ameer, on Monday.

While the foreign minister tweeted that they had discussed “economy recovery and development cooperation” at the meeting, the President’s Office earlier this month confirmed that the Chinese government has already deferred repayments of some loans taken for the upcoming year.

China had earlier, under the G20 Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI), reduced this year’s loan repayment figure to USD 75 million from USD 100 million.

Foreign Minister Shahid also stressed that China “has always been an important partner” to the Maldives.

He added that the Maldivian government will be working "very closely” with China, to overcome the present economic challenges faced by the country due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Speaker and former President, Mohamed Nasheed, recently expressed concern over the island nation’s enormous debt to China, adding that this is “totally unaffordable”. According to Nasheed, debt repayments ‘amount to 53 percent of government revenue and over 80 percent of this goes to China’.

Following this, the Chinese ambassador said that the southeastern nation “is always ready to offer its helping hand to Maldives for a strengthened partnership and shared future”.

The Chinese official attached photos of some news stories to his tweet, one with a reminder of China’s combined debt relief of USD 2.1 billion to developing countries, under the G20 framework.

China has been a generous contributor to the island nation’s response efforts since the coronavirus outbreak surfaced. As such, China has donated essential medical supplies and equipment and assisted in constructing accommodation blocks for expatriate workers.