Mohamed Nasheed, the first democratically-elected President of Maldives, has strongly condemned “appalling” social media posts by a minister in the archipelago’s government on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to Lakshadweep islands, India’s smallest Union Territory.

PM Modi’s visit to the Union Territory comprising 36 islands with an area of 32 sqkm was seen a move to promote tourism on the island.

In her tweet, the Maldivian minister Mariyam Shiuna used derogatory language against PM Modi. Another minister of the island nation accused India of targeting the archipelago and said India faces significant challenges in competing with the Maldives in beach tourism.

Condemning these statements, Mr Nasheed asked President Mohamed Muizzu to tell the world that the comments by the ministers “do not reflect government policy”.

“What appalling language by Maldives government official Mariyam Shiuna towards the leader of a key ally, that is instrumental for Maldives’ security and prosperity. The Mohamed Muizzu government must distance itself from these comments and give clear assurance to India they do not reflect gov policy,” Mr Nasheed, former Maldives President, said in a post on X.

What appalling language by Maldives Government official @shiuna_m towards the leader of a key ally, that is instrumental for Maldives’ security and prosperity. @MMuizzu gov must distance itself from these comments and give clear assurance to India they do not reflect gov policy.

— Mohamed Nasheed (@MohamedNasheed) January 7, 2024

Mr Nasheed was elected President in 2008, but resigned in 2012 after what he called a coup engineered by his rivals.

India-Maldives ties in the past few months have been strained, after President Mohamed Muizzu came to power.

Mr Muizzu took over as President in November 2023. In his election pledge, he said he would remove a small contingent of some 75 Indian military personnel in his island nation and change Maldives’s “India first” policy.

Seen as a pro-China politician, Mr Muizzu had defeated his India-friendly predecessor Ibrahim Mohamed Solih in the presidential run-off held in September.

Mr Muizzu is scheduled to visit China on Monday, the Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement. Chinese President Xi Jinping invited him, China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Friday.

“China and the Maldives boast time-honoured friendship. In the past 52 years since the establishment of diplomatic ties, the two countries have treated each other with respect and supported each other, setting a fine example of equality and mutual benefits between countries of different sizes,” said Wang Wenbin, another spokesperson of the Chinese foreign ministry, according to news agency PTI.

Mr Muizzu’s predecessors in the recent past visited India first, considering the wide-ranging bilateral ties and the Maldives’ proximity to India, followed by China which has expanded its influence in the island nation by investing in major infrastructure projects there.

The new Maldives President had met PM Modi in Dubai on the sidelines of the COP28 climate talks in December 2023. Both leaders had agreed to set up a core group to discuss the multidimensional relations and further deepen ties.

The meeting also took place after Mr Muizzu asked New Delhi to withdraw 77 Indian military personnel from the Maldives and decided to review more than 100 bilateral agreements between the two countries.

The new Maldives Vice President Hussain Mohamed Latheef last month visited China, his first visit abroad, and took part in the China-sponsored China-Indian Ocean Region Forum on Development Cooperation in Kunming.

Significantly, while praising Chinese infrastructure projects, Mr Latheef made no mention of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) under which most of the Maldives’ infrastructure projects were built.

The Maldives is India’s key maritime neighbour in the Indian Ocean Region and occupies a special place in India’s initiatives such as SAGAR, or Security and Growth for All in the Region, and the ‘Neighbourhood-First Policy’ of the Modi government.

The Maldives’ proximity to India, barely 70 nautical miles from the island of Minicoy in Lakshadweep, and 300 nautical miles from the mainland’s western coast, and its location at the hub of commercial sea lanes running through the Indian Ocean, gives it significant strategic importance.

The Maldivian government today suspended ministers whose social media posts against India and Prime Minister Narendra Modi sparked a massive firestorm with several Indians even claiming to have cancelled their scheduled trip to the nation made up of more than a hundred islands dotted with luxury resorts. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs today issued a statement on the stand of the Government of India in relation to some posts on social media that are insulting to neighboring India,” the Maldives goverment said in a statement.

“Those who made such posts on social media while in government positions have now been suspended from their jobs,” the statement said without revealing the names of those who have been suspended.

As per local media, ministers Mariyam Shiuna, Malsha and Hassan Zihan have been suspended.

It all began when these ministers and some other leaders in the Maldives posted derogatory remarks against PM Modi after he posted several photos and video from his recent visit to Lakshadweep. His posts where he was seen snorkelling went viral, prompting social media users to suggest India’s smallest Union Territory as an alternate tourist destination to the Maldives.

The Maldivian government, earlier in the day, distanced itself from these remarks and said the opinions were  “personal and do not represent the views of the Government” after several opposition leaders in the country slammed the “appalling language”.

 The freedom of expression should be exercised in a democratic and responsible manner, and in ways that do not spread hatred, and negativity, and hinder close relationships between the Maldives and its international partners, it said.

This comes as a big reassurance to India amid the diplomatic tussle with the island nation. 

The geography of both these destinations is very similar as both these places have low lying islands, reefs and pristine beaches. Lakshadweep and Maldives are separated by the Eight Degree Channel.

Bangladesh’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has won re-election for a fifth term Sunday, officials said, following a boycott led by an opposition party she branded a “terrorist organisation”.

Hasina’s ruling Awami League “has won more than 50 percent seats,” an Election Commission spokesman told AFP, with counting ongoing.

She has presided over breakneck economic growth in a country once beset by grinding poverty, but her government has been accused of rampant human rights abuses and a ruthless opposition crackdown.

Her party faced almost no effective rivals in the seats it contested, but it avoided fielding candidates in a few constituencies, an apparent effort to avoid the legislature being branded a one-party institution.

The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), whose ranks have been decimated by mass arrests, called a general strike and, along with dozens of others, refused to participate in a “sham election”.

Hasina, 76, had called for citizens to show faith in the democratic process — but election officials said initial reports suggested a meagre turnout of some 40 percent.

“The BNP is a terrorist organisation,” she told reporters after casting her vote. “I am trying my best to ensure that democracy should continue in this country.”

Media collating results from polling stations said Hasina had won more than two-thirds of seats in parliament with nearly 90 percent of results declared.

Of the 264 seats of the total 300 announced, Hasina’s Awami League had won 204 and her allied Jatiya Party nine more, according to results collated by Somoy TV, the country’s largest private news broadcaster.

Among the victors was Shakib Al Hasan, the Bangladesh cricket team captain, who won his seat for Hasina’s party be a landslide, local officials said.

‘Disgrace’

First-time voter Amit Bose, 21, said he had cast his ballot for his “favourite candidate”, but others said they had not bothered because the outcome was assured.

“When one party is participating and another is not, why would I go to vote?” said rickshaw-puller Mohammad Saidur, 31.

BNP head Tarique Rahman, speaking from Britain where he lives in exile, told AFP he feared “fake votes” would be used to boost voter turnout.

“What unfolded was not an election, but rather a disgrace to the democratic aspirations of Bangladesh,” he wrote on social media, alleging he had seen “disturbing pictures and videos” backing his claims.

‘Fear of ‘further crackdown’

The BNP and other parties staged months of protests last year, demanding Hasina step down ahead of the vote. Officers in the port city of Chittagong broke up an opposition protest Sunday, firing shotguns and tear gas canisters.

But election officials said voting was largely peaceful, with nearly 800,000 police officers and soldiers deployed countrywide.

Meenakshi Ganguly, from Human Rights Watch, said Sunday that the government had failed to reassure opposition supporters that the polls would be fair, warning that “many fear a further crackdown”.

Politics in the world’s eighth-most populous country was long dominated by the rivalry between Hasina, the daughter of the country’s founding leader, and two-time premier Khaleda Zia, wife of a former military ruler.

Hasina has been the decisive victor since returning to power in a 2009 landslide, with two subsequent polls accompanied by widespread irregularities and accusations of rigging.

Zia, 78, was convicted of graft in 2018 and is now in ailing health at a hospital in Dhaka. BNP head Rahman is her son.

‘Dangerous combination’

Hasina has accused the BNP of arson and sabotage during last year’s protest campaign, which was mostly peaceful but saw several people killed in police confrontations.

The government’s security forces have been dogged by allegations of extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances — charges it rejects.

Economic headwinds have left many dissatisfied with Hasina’s government, after sharp spikes in food costs and months of chronic blackouts in 2022.

Pierre Prakash of the International Crisis Group said before the vote that Hasina’s government was clearly “less popular than it was a few years ago, yet Bangladeshis have little real outlet at the ballot box”.

“That is a potentially dangerous combination.”

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)