India wants to leverage its advantages, such as size and the infrastructure it has put in place, to help countries in the Indian Ocean region improve their own economies and boost security, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval said on Friday.
“The technological and infrastructural facilities that India has been able to build up, we would like to throw open and make it available for the best use of the countries of the region,” Doval said at the second Goa Maritime Conclave for the Indian Ocean Region countries hosted by the Indian Navy.
Doval pointed out that India had provided navigational warnings and hydrographic surveys for neighbouring countries.
“In our ‘neighbourhood first’ policy, it is our commitment to cooperate with all of you in fighting terror, organised crime, drug trafficking and narcotics and arms smuggling,” he said.
“However, India still lacks in many areas where we would like to develop and grow, in a way that not only maximises our national benefits but is also useful to the countries in our neighbourhood,” Doval said.
Doval said the plan was only to cooperate and not to build a naval alliance.
“I would like to underline that we are not part of any alliance. Our cooperation is not directed against any country. Our cooperation is truly intended and focused on bringing about a change that will only add towards the prosperity of each country and region,” Doval said.
“There are many things that need to be done but none of us is in a position to do it alone. Together we can contribute and that brings about the element of contra complementarity. It has got a much greater space because all of us have contiguous relationships, we do not have any areas of strategic conflict. We consider that anything that is good for one country is going to contribute to the wellness of the rest,” Doval said.
The maritime conclave is being hosted by Chief of Naval Staff Admiral Karambir Singh and attended by the naval chiefs of Indian Ocean littoral countries such as the Maldives, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Kenya, Indonesia, Singapore, Seychelles, Mauritius and Myanmar, among others.
Admiral Karambir Singh also addressed the event and listed the problems facing the Indian Ocean countries and the challenges the navies confronted.
“Climate change, rising sea levels, natural calamities pose clear and present dangers. Maritime terror, drug smuggling IUU (illegal unreported unregulated) fishing, poaching, trafficking, etc, have increasingly occupied navies across the region,” Singh said in his inaugural speech.
“There is a recognition that no one nation can do it all alone. The vastness of the oceans is only contradicted by the inadequacy of our individual resources. No single entity can single-handedly requisition the full scale of assets, economics and expertise to tackle the gamut of challenges faced. This is also crucial, given the transnational nature of threats,” he said.
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