US TO SUPPORT INDIA TO DEFEND ITS TERRITORIAL SOVEREIGNTY AND LIBERTY
The 3rd India-US 2+2 dialogue held in New Delhi on 27th October 2020 had a very fruitful interaction by the top dignitaries of both the nations. The United States vowed to support India to defend its territorial sovereignty and liberty. Addressing the media, U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said that, “the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is “no friend to democracy”.
“The United States will stand with the people of India as they face threats to their sovereignty and their liberty,” said Mr. Pompeo hinting at the ongoing tense scenario in eastern Ladakh where Indian and Chinese forces in a standoff since May. Mr. Pompeo also referred to the greater threats posed by China in the Asia-Pacific region and the COVID-19 pandemic.
The observations about the threats to Indian sovereignty came as New Delhi announced the signing of the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement on geospatial cooperation (BECA) with the U.S.
In his opening remarks, Defence Minister Mr. Rajnath Singh laid out the challenges before India. He said, “We are meeting today at an extraordinary time. This pandemic is something that we have never experienced in our lifetime. Our partnership is becoming stronger because of the challenges that we are facing at present.” He further added, “We have had comprehensive discussions on key aspects of our bilateral and multilateral cooperation. We considered the major challenges we face. The need for quick economic recovery and growth, prevention of the Pandemic, rebuild the global supply chains and related issues received obvious priority in our discussions.
Apart from BECA, India and the U.S. also sealed a MoU on Technical Cooperation in Earth Observations and Earth Sciences, and an agreement to extend duration of the MoU regarding the Global Center for Nuclear Energy Partnership. The two sides also signed an agreement on electronic exchange of customs data and a letter of intent regarding cooperation in traditional Indian medicines.
Earlier, India and US had also signed LEMOA in 2016 and COMCASA in 2018 is a significant achievement in that direction.
MoD also highlighted some of the other noteworthy steps taken by both India and US in follow up to the earlier discussions. These include Positioning a USN LO at IFC-IOR and Indian LO at NAVCENT, Bahrain; greater interaction and coordination with CENTCOM and AFRICOM; setting up of the COMSEC account and increasing the scope and complexities of our exercises. Now LO’s at each other’s establishments could be leveraged to enhance our information sharing architecture. To sum it up, our military to military cooperation is progressing well.
The current 2 + 2 meeting also explored probable capacity building and other joint cooperation activities in third countries, including our neighborhood and beyond. We have convergence of views on a number of such proposals and will take those forward.
MoD welcomes the acceptance of our request for cooperation in the advanced field of maritime domain awareness. Both sides agreed to comprehend the requirements and initiate processes for joint development of requisite systems and expertise.
In the Defence Industrial Cooperation area, the recent initiative of ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ in Defence sector was underlined as a key driver and a guiding factor of our Defence Industrial Cooperation. The capabilities of Indian Defence Industry and their usefulness in the supply chain of major US platforms and systems were highlighted. The MoD said that India has identified priority Near-Term projects for joint development between respective agencies, which need to be fast tacked under the DTTI and resolved to work together in Defence R&D more efficiently.
Defence Innovation field has being growing consistently in our discussions in recent years, The instruments of ISA and iDEX/DIU MOl, which were agreed upon and signed during our last 2+2 meetings, are beginning to bear fruit. We welcomed holding of the inaugural meeting of iDEX-DIU in July 2020 through Video Conferencing and are looking forward to the first ISA Summit this year.
During the meeting, assessment of the security situation across the Indo Pacific was done. In that process, it was reaffirmed the commitment to peace, stability and prosperity of all countries in this region. Both nation agreed to upholding the rules based international order, respecting the rule of law and freedom of navigation in the international seas and upholding the territorial integrity and sovereignty of all states are essential. The defence cooperation is intended to further these objectives and both sides welcomed Australia joining the forthcoming Malabar Exercise.
