News
UN research vessel’s visit cancelled; Lanka loses US$ 1mn in FAO assistance
View(s):The Foreign Affairs Ministry has not responded to a request by the United Nations Resident Coordinator’s office to consider allowing the deployment of a research vessel into Sri Lanka’s waters under the UN flag, thus leading to the cancellation of the visit.
On June 12, the UN Resident Coordinator’s office wrote to the Foreign Affairs Ministry, requesting permission for the visit with an assurance that the Resident Coordinator remains available for a meeting at the earliest convenience to discuss the way forward and provide any additional information required.
However, the MFA had not sent a formal reply to the letter, and in the absence of a reply, it has become too late to deploy the research vessel “Dr Fridtj of Nansen”. The deployment was coordinated by the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
Such research vessels visit Sri Lanka every 6-10 years, with the last visit in 2018.
The Fisheries Ministry, the lead ministry, had requested the visit in 2023, and it was scheduled to take place from July 15 to 20 August 2025.
“Our communication has always been with the Fisheries Ministry, which took care of all necessary clearance. They took back the clearance after receiving communication from MFA,” a UN source said.
The MFA maintains that permission for foreign research vessels will not be given until the government finalises a new Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), for the purpose of which a committee headed by Foreign Minister Vijitha Herath has been set up.
The inter-ministerial committee was appointed in December, but its work has been slow in finalising recommendations.
In December 2023, the then government declared a one-year moratorium on permitting foreign research vessels in its territorial waters amidst pressure from India and the United States over Chinese vessels coming for research purposes.
The moratorium ended in December last year, and the present government announced it would not extend the moratorium but instead appoint a committee to draft new SOP for such vessels.
The MFA said the committee will study procedures adopted by other countries before it finalises guidelines, but it was not possible to put a timeline on when the new SOP would be ready.
Meanwhile, the UN Resident Coordinator Office in Colombo said in its letter to the MFA that the cancellation of the visit would not only incur direct losses of over $1 million to Sri Lanka through the FAO but also reduce the efficacy of upcoming programming financed by the Green Climate Fund, which would heavily rely on the data generated by the UN vessel. If the current visit should be cancelled, another would not be feasible until after 2030. Moreover, cancelling the visit would deprive the country of critical data essential to the government’s decision-making, damaging the prospects for economic development in a key sector of the economy.
The letter added that F. Nansen’s visit to Sri Lanka is organised through a partnership between the FAO and the national government, sailing under the United Nations flag. Sri Lankan fisheries experts and scientists from the National Aquatic Resources Research and Development Agency, as well as officers from the Sri Lankan Navy, will be closely working with the F. Nansen technical team in implementing activities in full adherence with all pertinent national legislation.
“All data collected will be published only with the government’s prior clearance. This is the fifth visit of such a vessel, the last one visiting Sri Lanka in 2018. In this context, the FAO received a letter dated 19 May 2025 from the Ministry of Fisheries, Aquatic and Ocean Resources cancelling F. Nansen’s visit pending the development of standard operating procedures for foreign research vessels,” the UN office said.
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