Before Prime Minister Narendra Modi emplaned for India after attending the QUAD summit in Tokyo, he was hosted by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida for a quiet “tempura” meal – a Japanese dish usually consisting of seafood and vegetables deep-fried in batter – over bilateral talks with both countries deciding to further strengthen economic cooperation.
According to reports reaching from Tokyo, PM Modi was very satisfied with his QUAD and bilateral meetings in Tokyo with Japan positive towards economic opportunity in India apart from having a shared agenda under the QUAD rubric. A keen follower of Japanese culture, discipline and development since his Gujarat CM days, PM Modi met three former PMs of Japan apart from the present one and interacted with 40 CEOs of top Japanese companies during his fast and furious visit. It was quite evident from the bilateral meetings with PM Kishida that both countries are invested in each other with Indo-Pacific Economic Framework and Maritime Domain Awareness being the new dimensions for deepening engagement under QUAD.
“The Indo-Pacific Economic Framework is virtually a free trade agreement by another name as the US cannot sign the latter due to resistance from Capitol Hill. The negotiations on IPEF are expected to be completed by the end of this year and India will be benefited as it is a founding member and has uniquely distanced itself from any multilateral trade engagement with China as a member,” said a former foreign secretary.
While QUAD has come out openly for free and open Indo-Pacific, it has taken a step further by creating a maritime domain awareness platform to monitor and alert on illegal, unregulated, and unprotected fishing by “dark” vessels Indian and Pacific Oceans. The maritime surveillance initiative will be based in QUAD as well as the ASEAN countries to ensure that massive and reckless fishing by Chinese trawlers in the region is not only monitored but also prevented by alerting the relevant countries. As China ranks the worst offender in 2021 IUU fishing index, the initiative is a push back against Beijing’s muscle-flexing in the Indo-Pacific, which accounts for 80 to 95 per cent of illegal fishing in the region after having overfished in its own waters.
While there is an illegal fishing dimension to the maritime initiative, it also has a security aspect as all vessels in the Indo-Pacific will be monitored to ensure that UN Laws of Seas are not violated by member nations in the South and East China Seas. “Using its diplomatic and military muscle, the Chinese trawlers are virtually raping the Indo-Pacific by illegal fishing and hitting at the economies of small island nations in the region by unregulated fishing,” said a former Indian Navy Admiral.
Although China and Russia exercised their nuclear bombers in the Sea of Japan on the day that QUAD leaders met in Tokyo, the democratic leaders were quite unfazed by the drama and have decided to close ranks for protecting the Indo-Pacific.
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