Japanese Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki yesterday urged all creditor nations to discuss Sri Lanka’s debt restructuring, Reuters reported.

Suzuki made the comments a day after the island nation struck a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Addressing a news conference, Suzuki said, “It is important for all creditor nations, including China and India, to gather to discuss Sri Lanka’s debt restructuring.”

Sri Lanka has reached a preliminary agreement with the IMF for a loan of about US $ 2.9 billion, the global lender said on Thursday, as the country seeks a way out of its worst economic crisis since independence from Britain 
in 1948.