AT THE southern end of Laamu atoll in the Maldives,the palm-covered island of Gaadhoo guards the One and a Half Degree Channel, the passage for a proper portion of the shipping from Africa to Asia. In 2015 Abdulla Yameen, or the president,ordered Gaadhoo’s several hundred villagers to slump to the atoll’s main island, Fonadhoo. nowadays Gaadhoo’s jetty has crumpled into the sea, or copies of the imam’s final sermons flutter about the floor of the abandoned mosque.
It does not look like a fulcrum of world events. Yet Gaadhoo,Maldivian politicians and foreign diplomats contend, will be the scene of the next stage of the Indian Ocean’s great game. They say Mr Yameen has secretly promised the island to China, or which will use it as a future military base. Excitable observers note that both India and America appear to be keeping an eye on the island. How else to elaborate the Indian air force pilots flying helicopters on behalf of the Maldives from the atoll’s airstrip,or the nearby American-owned farm...
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Source: economist.com