Defense: India and Bangladesh to intensify cooperation
New Delhi: India and Bangladesh have decided to intensify their defense cooperation and military engagements.
They took this decision at the fourth India-Bangladesh Annual Defense Dialogue held in New Delhi on Thursday.
The meeting was co-chaired by India’s Defence Secretary, Dr. Ajay Kumar, and the Principal Staff Officer of the Bangladesh Armed Forces Division, Lt. Gen. Waker-Uz-Zaman.
An official report said they reviewed the current defense cooperation between the two nations, which has expanded despite challenges brought on by the Covid-19 outbreak.
The two neighbors will make their bilateral exercises and training more challenging. They reaffirmed their determination to enhance interactions between their armed forces further as they assessed the status of various bilateral defense cooperation initiatives.
India’s Ministry of Defence said cooperation between the defense industry and capability-builders also came up for discussion as the two parties stressed the importance of cooperating closely to implement the USD 500 million line of credit offered by India to Bangladesh for defense-related components.
Dr. Kumar applauded Bangladesh’s achievements in the UN’s efforts at peacekeeping.
He also invited the Bangladeshi delegation to the upcoming Def-Expo 2022, scheduled to be held in Gandhinagar, Gujarat, from October 18 to 22.
(Venkatesh)
