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As Lanka seeks fuel from India, Modi pushes for oil tank farm and joint energy projectsBy Damith Wickremasekera Sunday Times lk 29-03-2026Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged President Anura Kumara Dissanayake during a phone conversation this week to expedite the energy sector projects agreed upon between the two countries, particularly the work on the joint venture to develop the Trincomalee oil tank farm.The prodding came when President Dissanayake called Mr Modi to request rescue supplies from India’s IOCL (Indian Oil-Lanka). The government had asked for Indian government intervention to release 38,000 metric tonnes of fuel that had been held up by IOCL due to disruptions in fuel supplies after the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.Mr Modi told the Sri Lankan President that the project would be mutually beneficial and would ensure Sri Lanka’s energy security as well as increase the country’s storage capacity.Under a 2023 joint venture Trinco Petroleum Terminal (Pvt) Limited agreement between Sri Lanka’s Indian Oil Corporation and the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC), 61 tanks in all are to be developed, with nine in the first phase. However, work on the project has been stalled for several years even though the agreement is in force.“The renovation of each tank will cost around USD 1.2 million, with the entire project to cost around USD 75-100 million,” Foreign Affairs Minister Vijitha Herath said. The matter had been discussed during talks he held with India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishanker.Mr Herath told the Sunday Times that a special cabinet paper would be submitted shortly to expedite the project and call for tenders to renovate the oil tanks.“This project will ensure that domestic supply will be stable while India can use the facility for bunkering or for exporting products from here,” he said.In the joint India-Lanka statement issued following President Dissanayake’s visit to India in December 2024, the two sides acknowledged ongoing cooperation in the development of Trincomalee Tank Farms, with both leaders deciding to support the development of Trincomalee as a regional energy and industrial hub.Meanwhile, a shipment of 38,000 MT of petroleum products – 20,000 MT of diesel and 18000 MT of petrol – from India arrived in Colombo today.“Lanka IOC had earlier secured fuel supplies for March from the Middle East and Singapore. However, suppliers with whom the contracts were placed expressed their inability to deliver the product and invoked force majeure in view of supply disruptions and vessel unavailability due to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East,” the Indian High Commission said in a statement yesterday.“Due to the above disruptions, rescue supplies were requested from India from IOCL. The current shipment of 38,000 MT is part of these supplies. The Government of India, through Lanka IOC, has extended support to Sri Lanka for maintaining continuity of fuel supply,” the statement said.
Donald Trump says US could ‘take the oil in Iran’US president tells the FT he is considering seizing strategic Kharg Island even as negotiations continueEdward Luce in Washington FT 29-03-2026Donald Trump has said he wants to “take the oil in Iran” and could seize the export hub of Kharg Island, as the US sends thousands of troops to the Middle East.The US president told the FT in an interview on Sunday that his “preference would be to take the oil”, comparing the potential move to Venezuela, where the US intends to control the oil industry “indefinitely” following its capture of strongman leader Nicolás Maduro in January.The president’s comments come as the US-Israeli war against Iran has thrust the Middle East into crisis and sent the price of oil surging by more than 50 per cent in a month. Brent crude rose above $116 a barrel on Monday morning in Asia, near its highest level since the conflict began.Trump said: “To be honest with you, my favourite thing is to take the oil in Iran but some stupid people back in the US say: ‘why are you doing that?’ But they’re stupid people.”Such a move would involve seizing Kharg Island, through which most of Iran’s oil is exported.Trump has been beefing up US forces in the region, with the Pentagon ordering the deployment of 10,000 troops trained to seize and hold land. About 3,500 troops arrived in the region on Friday, including roughly 2,200 marines. Another 2,200 marines are en route, while thousands of troops from the 82nd Airborne Division have also been ordered to the region.But an assault on the export hub would be risky, raising the chances of more US casualties and extending the cost and duration of the war.“Maybe we take Kharg Island, maybe we don’t. We have a lot of options,” Trump told the FT. “It would also mean we had to be there [in Kharg Island] for a while.”Asked about the state of Iranian defence on Kharg Island he said: “I don’t think they have any defence. We could take it very easily.” The conflict has broadened in recent days, with an attack on an air base in Saudi Arabia on Friday wounding 12 American troops and damaging a $270mn US E-3 Sentry surveillance aircraft. Houthi rebels in Yemen also fired a ballistic missile at Israel, threatening a new phase of escalation that analysts said could worsen the global energy crisis. However, despite his threats to seize Iranian oil production, Trump stressed that indirect talks between the US and Iran via Pakistani “emissaries” were progressing well. Trump has set a deadline of April 6 for Iran to accept a deal ending the war or face US strikes on its energy sector.When asked whether a ceasefire deal could be reached in the coming days that would reopen the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway through which a fifth of the world’s oil usually flows, Trump declined to offer specific details.“We’ve got about 3,000 targets left — we’ve bombed 13,000 targets — and another couple of thousand targets to go,” he said. “A deal could be made fairly quickly.”Last week, he said that Iran had permitted 10 Pakistan-flagged oil tankers through the Strait of Hormuz as a “present” to the White House. The number of tankers had now been doubled to 20, he told the FT, which was not possible to immediately verify.“They gave us 10,” he said. “Now they’re giving 20 and the 20 have already started and they’re going right up the middle of the Strait.”Trump added that Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliamentary speaker and one of the country’s top wartime leaders, had authorised the additional tankers.“He’s the one who authorised the ships to me,” Trump said. “Remember I said they’re giving me a present? And everyone said: ‘What’s the present? Bullshit.’ When they heard about that they kept their mouth shut and the negotiations are going very well.”Trump also claimed that Iran had already had “regime change” after Iran’s longtime supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and many other senior officials were killed at the start of the war and in strikes that followed.“The people we’re dealing with are a totally different group of people . . . [They] are very professional,” Trump said.Trump also reiterated his claims that Mojtaba Khamenei, Khamenei’s son and Iran’s new supreme leader, could be either dead or severely injured.“The son is either dead or in extremely bad shape,” Trump said. “We’ve not heard from him at all. He’s gone.”Tehran has insisted the head of state is safe and well after his absence from the public eye fuelled speculation he had been badly injured.Additional reporting by James Politi and Steff Chávez in Washington-----------------Please use the sharing tools found via the share button at the top or side of articles. Copying articles to share with others is a breach of FT.com T&Cs and Copyright Policy. Email licensing@ft.com to buy additional rights. Subscribers may share up to 10 or 20 articles per month using the gift article service. 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