Israel-SL ties focus on counter terrorism, agriculture
Sri Lanka and Israel will continue its cooperation on defence and assist in the area of counter terrorism in addition to supporting advances in agriculture and water management.
Historically Israel has been assisting Sri Lanka in counter terrorism and training, the newly appointed Israeli Ambassador Naor Gilon told the Business Times during his visit to Colombo this week to present his credentials to the President. He had discussions with the President and Prime Minister in the areas of agriculture, water management and counter terrorism.
He noted that unfortunately Israel is today facing what Sri Lanka had gone through in the past like suicide bombers and in this respect they have developed capabilities.
“We are happy to share this knowledge with our friends,” he said adding that this was not a subject of any relevance to the public but that they continue to maintain cooperation in terms of security in defence.
Sri Lanka has for decades been a buyer of military weapons from Israel in addition to obtaining military training for its armed forces.
Diplomatic relations between the two countries had a bumpy road which started out in 1956 that had on several occasions been severed due to political reasons.
Discussions between the two states that have for years been revolving around the assistance in agriculture is likely to be taken up for which they need to find a local partner to carry out the operations.
Ambassador Gilon pointed out that they could replicate the advances made in terms of agriculture in India in Sri Lanka with the aim of increasing the yields and improving the processes adopted in farming. He explained that in India they had already established 30 centres of excellence with the adoption of smart irrigation and farming in controlled environment using sophisticated and expensive systems in total greenhouse. They also assist the average farmer by engaging them in adopting a more simple system that would be more economical in terms of investments in new processes and technology.
They have also carried out organic farming practices in India as well but this is a more expensive system and commenting on the agriculture policy adopted by Sri Lanka he noted that tailor-made solutions could be provided as well.
Sri Lanka has also entered into an agreement with Israel in 2020 to provide caregiver jobs under the “Temporary Employment of Sri Lankan workers” scheme. It was pointed out that about 7500 had been taking up jobs in Israel through this scheme by the end of last year.
Sri Lanka had raised concerns over Israel’s decisions to carry out a possible annexation of the West Bank, Mr. Gilon pointed out that this is currently not on the agenda of Israel for now.
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