Prior to travelling to India to see Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s inauguration, President Ranil Wickremesinghe of Sri Lanka discussed how geopolitics and international rivalry have shaped the Indian Ocean region, transforming it into the “Indo-Pacific.”

These days, maps are created based on geopolitics rather than geography. We were part of the Indian Ocean region for a long time, but it was suddenly renamed the Indo-Pacific. Friday, the president of Sri Lanka stated, “That is [the outcome of] geopolitical cartography.” He was giving a video speech at a roundtable discussion on the “Bay of Bengal and Indian Ocean Outlook,” which was organised by the Geopolitical Cartographer, a think tank with its headquarters in Colombo.

This year, from September 17 to October 16, Sri Lanka, a vital ally of India in its neighborhood amidst a growing China, will hold presidential elections.