Sri Lanka needs more loans to face transitional period: PM

July 22, 2016 (LBO) – Sri Lanka's Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said the government needs some more loans from countries like China, Japan and India to keep macro economic stability in the country. In an interview with Channel NewsAsia, Prime Minister said the recent 1.5 billion US dollar IMF loan is a major measure taken for macro economic stability. “We’ll have to take some more loans in time to come,” Wickremesinghe said. “We need some of those commercial loans. We need some more of the investments and the loans from China, Japan and India.” Prime Minister anticipated that the global economic situation will be better so that the interest rates will be even more favorable to Sri Lanka. He added that the country is now facing a transitional period of three, four years to boost exports. “Once our export growth starts moving, and then we will be in a position to repay loans. You see this is a transition period of three, four years,” he said. “That’s why we have a national government of the two main parties. Once we get through this, the way is open for us. So the crucial period is these three, four years.” Conversation with Channel NewsAsia's flagship one-on-one interview programme, full Interview: