Selatan

Everyone can have their opinions, I only look at facts and the 2 professors provided lots of facts. The fact here is that Sri Lanka got into financial trouble because of the costly sovereign bonds that it had issued, not because of the Hambantota port loan. It is a well known fact that the huge bulk (90 to 95%) of the debts owed by developing countries around the world are to Western countries, Japan, the IMF and the World Bank but somehow China was highly demonized for its small share of ownership of the debts. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what is going on - banks from other countries, especially Western ones, cannot stand the competition from China.

But if it was a trap, someone must set it up. The Chinese obviously did not. They just lend the money because they have too much to lend. It's like a real estate agent trying to sell you a very costly property. He doesn't care who you are going to borrow from. He is the initiator of the debt trap.

These 2 professors from Harvard and Johns Hopkins really did a good job researching the subject: The Chinese ‘Debt Trap’ Is a Myth As said in the wiki article, China was not even involved in the beginning. It was the Canadians and the Danes that did the feasibility studies. I particularly like this paragraph from the above article:

Looks like you didn't know anything about Taiwan's original claim. Here's the 1947 claim by the ROC (called the 11-dash line map). To appease Vietnam, the PRC removed 2-dashes from the original Taiwan claim, becoming the 9-dash line map. The irony here is that Vietnam's later claim itself is just slightly smaller than Taiwan's. Just to remind you that many nations in the region have overlapping claims against each other, not just with China.

Yes, tell that to the ROC. The government that first made the South China Sea claims was not the People's Republic of China. It was the Republic of China (aka Taiwan) that first made that claim back in 1947 (before the founding of the PRC), with the blessing of the United States. In 1946, the ROC had sent warships which were given by the US to occupy the Spratlys and Paracels islands. Some of the islands were named after the ROC warships that were sent there. Here's one of the warship: USS Decker aka ROCS Tai Ping

Both Malaysia and Thailand are weird countries. Normally, one would only go overseas to work as labourers if jobs are unavailable locally. But both Malaysia and Thailand have millions of foreign workers.

China is a major bully? Then the US is considered as what? A hyper-bully? The rest of the world has suffered terribly from bullying by Western powers for the past few centuries until today. Ever since the founding of the PRC, China has shown to the US, the UK, the Soviet Union and India that it cannot be pushed around any more. Other countries were not so lucky, including even a big power like Russia, which failed to stop the expansion of NATO. Spreading rumours is a form of bullying, didn't you learn that in school?

Unsubstantiated rumour treated as fact? Even the Taiwan defence ministry refuted it. In 2022, Xi was rumoured to be under house arrest when he was not seen for a few weeks after returning home from overseas. This year, Xi was rumoured to have suffered an aneurysm after he was reported to be skipping the G20 summit. But some people just love these anti-China rumours.

Myanmar militia repatriates 1,200 China nationals allegedly involved in online scams The military junta is not in control of the whole country. And in Cambodia, there are local businesspeople and politicians that are involved in the scam business. Four Thai Citizens Arrested in Cambodia Over Links to Online Scam and Triple Murder

Haven for scams: Hit movies further sour Chinese view of South-east Asia

The news is full of headlines about ‘China’s economic collapse’ — ignore them

Is China the enemy of Germany? Here, look at the specifications of this Chinese destroyer: Type 052D destroyer

Many Chinese warships, submarines and coast guard ships use German and French engines. Diesel engines has dual-use purposes. MTU even has a joint-venture production in China. Somebody has been making noise to the German government (not difficult to figure out who that was) to sabotage the deal to prevent Thailand from moving closer towards China. Rolls-Royce and China Yuchai to jointly produce MTU engines

Singapore money laundering case exposes links to Cambodia So easy to obtain Cambodian citizenship. China does not recognize dual-citizenships so these bunch of ethnic Chinese criminals are no longer citizens of the PRC.

Not only should the Chinese be worried about safety in Thailand. Many Malaysians like me are starting to worry about safety in Thailand too. Of course, abductions are rare. But they do happen. This is one recent case reported in a Chinese-language newspaper in Malaysia: Five Malaysian men and women jumped out of their e-hailing car to avoid being sold as slaves Malaysians are highly sought after by scam syndicates because they are mostly trilinguals. Most Chinese Malaysians can speak Chinese (Mandarin, Cantonese and Hokkien), English and Malay.

Thailand land borders are rather porous. Malaysian fugitives often choose to cross into Thailand by land illegally to escape from the law. If criminal gangs want to set up shop in another country, they would go for some kind of a long term residency visa or even try to gain citizenship. In recent crackdowns on money laundering in Singapore, many of the Chinese suspects have Cambodian citizenships. So, if Thailand really wants to clamp down on criminals coming in from China, it better tightens up regulations on long-term visas instead.

Visitors from Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Philippines and Indonesia can enter Thailand visa-free. Are you trying to say that the people from those few countries are richer and better educated than the Chinese?

Is the system in Malaysia that was set up by the British democratic? Over here in Malaysia, our senators are also appointed, not elected. And only the Malaysian king can decide who becomes the prime minister, not the members of parliament of both the lower house and the senate. Every country in the world is entitled to its own style of political system. Westerners do not have a monopoly on wisdom.

Don't talk nonsense. I'm a Malaysian. The 1MDB scandal didn't involve China. The US bank Goldman Sachs had to pay billions to Malaysia to avoid prosecution for its role in the 1MDB scandal.

Convicted criminals who have served their sentences don't have the right to travel?

Why should a commercial company listed in Hong Kong with shareholders from all over the world hand back a 99-year port concession for free if it has paid for it? Mind you, this company also owns ports all over the world, such as Miami and Houston in North America, Antwerp and Rotterdam in Europe and Busan and Singapore in Asia. It also owns another port in Colombo, Sri Lanka. Are you suggesting that this commercial company stupidly give away all its assets for free to every country that it has acquired from? China Merchant Port Holdings Co. Ltd.

You didn't bother to read the article by the Atlantic that I have provided?

Here's a good read: The Chinese ‘Debt Trap’ Is a Myth And here's a fact that many didn't know - that Sri Lanka's Hambantota port project were supported by two Western feasibility studies - first by a Canadian firm, then later by a Danish firm. Another fact is that the Sri Lanka had no problem servicing the Hambantota port loan - it was having a problem servicing other loans

If you want a project to be completed quicker and cheaper, you need more Chinese workers. In Malaysia, the local workers working on the Chinese-funded East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) complained that they could barely keep up with their Chinese counterparts. And if you want a project to begin earlier, you need Chinese loans, or else wait for years for your own funds to become available.