The foreign policy of Maldives is primarily guided by its strategic and geographical location and its limited resource base. In earlier times, Maldives had close cultural and economic relations with Sri Lanka and Malabaris or Mapillas on the western coast of India. It had also developed ties with the Arabs and the Moors in the Middle East and Africa.
These close economic and cultural ties have left a great impact on the culture and society of Maldives, which can be seen in the Islamisation of the country. Maldives however, never developed any political links with outside countries. When it became a British protectorate, Maldives had little or no interaction with the outside world. It external relations were limited to the neighbouring South Asian countries. After its independence, the imperatives of developments induced Maldives to look beyond it immediate neighbours. It became a member of United Nations and its agencies like Colombo Plan, United Nations Developmental Programme (UNDP), World Health Organisations (WHO), Asian Development Bank etc.
It also established ties with donor countries, which finance its developmental activities. Maldives has broadly followed the policy of its South Asian neighbours like commitment to the principles of non-alignment and peaceful co-existence. It had sponsored a Resolution in 1989 in UN General Assembly for the protection of security of small states. It had also taken various initiatives in the UN towards the election of Indian Ocean as a Zone of Peace. In 1982. Maldives was granted a special membership of the Commonwealth and in 1985, and Maldives became one of the founder members of the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation (SAARC). Later, in 1990, the fifth SAARC annual conference was held in Male. Maldives has close relations with India.
In 1976, it signed an agreement demarcating the maritime boundary between the two countries. It has also received military assistance from India at President Gayoom’s request to repel a group of invading mercenaries Currently, this small state is caught up with the international issue of global warming and climate change as sea levels are rising around its atolls. It h*5 raised a host of questions as to the future of this atoll-state.