India’s troubled Adani invests in bankrupt Sri Lanka
COLOMBO: Money-strapped Sri Lanka on Thursday introduced its first main overseas funding because it declared chapter, approving a $442 million wind energy challenge by India’s scandal-hit Adani group.
Sri Lanka’s Board of Funding mentioned Adani Inexperienced Power, a part of the enterprise empire of controversial Indian tycoon Gautam Adani, will arrange two wind farms within the island’s north.
The whole funding will attain $442 million and the 2 crops will probably be supplying energy to the nationwide grid “by 2025”, the BOI mentioned in an announcement.
Bankrupt Sri Lanka hikes energy costs once more for IMF deal
The challenge comes after Sri Lanka awarded Adani a $700 million strategic port terminal challenge in Colombo in 2021.
That concession was broadly seen as a bid to handle New Delhi’s rising concern over China’s increasing affect within the area – Adani had been nominated because the contractor by the Indian authorities.
The agency is constructing a 1.4-kilometre, 20-metre deep jetty proper subsequent to a Chinese language-operated terminal at Colombo harbour, the one deep-sea container port between Dubai and Singapore.
Power minister Kanchana Wijesekera mentioned he met with Adani officers in Colombo on Wednesday to finalise the wind farm challenge.
“We count on the ability crops to be commissioned by December 2024,” he mentioned.
The event comes after a US funding agency final month accused Adani’s firms of accounting fraud and worth manipulation, triggering a rout that noticed $120 billion wiped off the group’s market capitalisation.
Adani denies the allegations.
A Chinese language agency was awarded a $12 million Asian Growth Financial institution-funded challenge to construct three wind farms on islands within the Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka in 2019, nevertheless it was cancelled after objections from New Delhi.
China is Sri Lanka’s largest official lender, accounting for 52 p.c of bilateral credit score. Colombo is awaiting monetary assurances from Beijing to unlock a $2.9 billion bailout from the Worldwide Financial Fund.
