WASHINGTON (AP) – John Kerry is making the first visit to Sri Lanka by a U.S. secretary of state in a decade, seizing a rare opportunity to champion democratic reform and to tighten ties at a strategic crossroads in the vast Indian Ocean.
The top American diplomat arrived early Saturday local time in Colombo, where he planned to meet with President Maithripala Sirisena and Sri Lanka’s prime minister and foreign minister. He also planned to speak with leading officials of the island nation’s Tamil minority.
Secretary of State Colin Powell visited Sri Lanka in early 2005, shortly after the deadly Indian Ocean tsunami. That was before fighting intensified between Sri Lanka’s government and the Tamil Tigers fighting to create an independent state. The military crushed the rebels in 2009, but only after tens of thousands were killed and accusations of war crimes were made by both sides.
The victorious president at that time, Mahinda Rajapaksa, proceeded to tighten his grip on power, weakening democracy and the rule of law, which isolated Sri Lanka internationally.
In January, however, Sirisena shocked Rajapaksa in a close election after vowing to overhaul a system widely seen as autocratic and suffocating for minorities. Earlier this week, the Parliament voted nearly unanimously to endorse Sirisena’s proposals to clip the powers of the president that Rajapaksa had expanded significantly.