evidence: The third misconception is that Chinese debt was responsible for inducing Sri Lanka’s debt distress. In reality, Sri Lanka’s debt crisis arose from excessive borrowing on Western-dominated capital markets to finance the government’s exorbitant and unsustainable deficit spending. (Jones & Hameiri, 2020). By 2016, 61% of the government’s budget was funded by foreign loans, with total government debt increasing by 52% between 2009 and 2016 (Jones & Hameiri, 2020). As a result, an estimated three-quarters of external government debt was owed to private financial institutions (Jones & Hameiri, 2020). In 2016, Sri Lankan debt related to Hambantota Port totalled $1.3 billion, comprising only 4.8% of the government’s total external debt (Jones & Hameiri, 2020). In the same year, according to the Sri Lankan Central Bank, repayment costs for the project were $67.5 million, making up a mere 3.3% of the $2.03 billion that went to servicing foreign debt (Jones & Hameiri, 2020).