Against the backdrop of growing Chinese assertiveness on maritime issues, India, France and Japan today launched a new dialogue to ensure that the Indo-Pacific remains a peaceful region, taking into account needs and concerns of all its inhabitants.

“An Indo-Pacific guided by norms and governed by rules, with freedom of navigation, open connectivity, and respect for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of all states, is an article of faith for India,” Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla said at the “India- France-Japan Workshop on Indo-Pacific.” The workshop was attended by French Ambassador Emmanuel Lenain and Japanese Ambassador Satoshi Suzuki.

Recalling that India’s Indo- Pacific strategy was enunciated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a speech in Singapore in 2018 as the “SAGAR” doctrine, The Indian diplomat said Modi had used it as an acronym for “Security and Growth for All in the Region”.

“This aspiration depends on securing end-to-end supply chains in the region; no disproportionate dependence on a single country; and ensuring prosperity for all stakeholder nations,” Shringla added.

The foreign secretary said it was natural for India to be engaged in cooperation with the key actors in the Indo-Pacific, notably France and Japan. With France, India has a highly developed maritime security partnership. Similarly, India and Japan enjoyed a relationship that was crucial to the Indo-Pacific architecture. India’s “SAGAR” vision for the region and Japan’s concept of a Free and Open Indo- Pacific (FOIP), both were convergent in principles.

Shringla said India has sought to strengthen security and freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific by becoming a net security provider ~ for instance in peace-keeping efforts or anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden. “Sharing what we can, in terms of equipment, training and exercises, we have built relationships with partner countries across the region.

To cite some examples, we are active in networks such as the Quad, with India, the United States, Japan and Australia as participants, and the India- Japan-US, India-France-Australia and India-Indonesia- Australia trilateral arrangements offer cases in point,” he added.