In an exclusive interview with the South China Morning Post, Malaysian Foreign Minister Saifuddin Abdullah said Malaysia and China will open their upcoming second Belt and Road Forum with “renewed spirits”.
Malaysia has given a green light to two stalled China-backed projects worth billions of dollars ahead of the forum in Beijing on April 25-27, 2019.
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad had suspended the East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) project after he took office in May 2018, but then said it could be resumed after China agreed to shave off nearly a third of its cost. The other project which is back on track is the prime Kuala Lumpur property development Bandar Malaysia. A China-backed consortium had won an open tender for the project said to have a “gross development value” of 140 billion ringgit (US$34 billion).
Critics say Malaysia resumed the two deals to preserve Chinese palm oil purchases after the European Union stopped considering the commodity a biofuel. Saifuddin Abdullah dismissed the allegation and said both China and Malaysia had adjusted their positions to accommodate each other.
