PANAJI: In a big step towards maritime security cooperation, India, Maldives and Sri Lanka are ready to increase intelligence sharing to overcome general threats such as terrorism and drug trafficking in the Indian Ocean (Ior) region, said the Head of the Admiral Navy India Karambir Singh is here on Monday.
Speaking at the Cave Maritime Conclary on the ‘Maritime Security & Non-Traditional Threats that appear, Singh underlined the need for other countries to gather and collaborate to overcome threats caused by non-state actors.
“Maldives, Sri Lanka, and the US will focus the operation in which we will deal with this as soon as intelligence in.
We will try to share intelligence, persuade our assets so we can catch them.
This is one example where we will take intelligence.
Which can be followed up for goodness with everyone in the region, “said the Navy Chief of Staff while speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Conclary.
Goa Cave Maritime Conclary (GMC) has the head of the Navy and Chief Maritime forces of the 12 Littoral Samudra Indies, including Bangladesh, Comoros, Indonesia, Madagascar, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritius, Myanmar, Seychelles, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Thailand.
Singh also said that friendly countries in IOR worked on collective maritime competencies.
“Every country has a geographical location, knowledge of operations, technology, labor and in this region we want to build something called collective maritime competence,” said Singh.
To increase bilateral cooperation and improve the ability of participating countries, India also offers to train and share maritime platforms with neighboring countries.
Quoting the example of Sri Lanka, which was successfully handled with LTTE, Singh said that other countries had many things to learn from Sri Lanka.
“If one of the 12 Ior countries see whatever capacity they want to increase, then we will try and offer them through our shipyard.
Likewise, the Naval Academy in Ezhimala does it very well so we have increased our intake.
What What we are trying to do is build collective maritime competencies because the Indo-Pacific region is too large for anyone to do it yourself, “said Singh.
The decision to share intelligence and work with Maldives and Sri Lanka was taken at Colombo Conclary in November 2020 when India’s National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, Defense Minister Maldives Mariya Didi and Defense Secretary Sri Lanka Kamal Gunaratne issued a joint statement about sharing intelligence and cooperation.