🔆 India-Saudi Strategic Partnership Council (SPC)

✅ The SPC is a high-level mechanism established between India and Saudi Arabia in 2019, to guide and enhance their bilateral relationship.
✅ It consists of two sub-committees, addressing various aspects of cooperation:
🔸Committee on Political,
🔸Security, Social, and Cultural Cooperation.
🔸Committee on Economy and Investments.
🔸India is the fourth country with which Saudi Arabia has formed such a strategic partnership, after the UK, France and China.

▪️Operation:
✅ The SPC operates at four functional levels:
🔸Summit level, involving the Prime Minister and Crown Prince.
🔸Ministerial-level engagements.
🔸Senior Officials Meetings.
🔸Joint Working Groups (JWGs) to facilitate detailed discussions and action plans.

▪️Key Functions:
✅The SPC serves as a comprehensive platform to foster collaboration across a wide range of sectors.
✅It facilitates in-depth discussions, policy formulation, and coordination at various levels to implement joint initiatives effectively.
✅JWGs under each committee focus on specific areas of cooperation, ensuring a well-structured approach to bilateral relations.

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✅In a recent maritime incident, the Malta-flagged Vessel MV Ruen fell victim to pirates in the Arabian Sea,. Responding swiftly, the Indian Navy , strategically based in the piracy -prone Gulf of Aden, intercepted the hijacked vessel, closely monitoring its trajectory toward the Somali coast.

✅The European Union Naval Force (EUNAVFOR) Operation Atalanta, a maritime security operation in the western Indian Ocean, joined the anti-piracy effort.

📍What is Maritime Piracy?

✅Article 101 of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) outlines acts constituting piracy.

✅These acts include violence, detention, or depredation committed for private ends on the high seas or outside the jurisdiction of any state.

✅The United States has initiated Operation Prosperity Guardian, a multinational security initiative to ensure security in the Red Sea.

✅A Convention held in Rome for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the safety of Maritime Navigation (1988):

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🔆Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Shri Piyush Goyal holds bilateral meeting with Minister for Trade of New Zealand Hon.

The meeting was aimed at strengthening the trade relations between India and New Zealand and exploring opportunities for mutual growth and cooperation.

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🔆EUs new pact on Migration and Asylum

📍Key Features of the New Pact:

✅Each EU country will be assigned a share of the 30,000 people the bloc expects to accommodate at any given time, based on GDP, population, border crossings, and more.

✅Countries unwilling to accept people can provide support to hosting peers through cash, equipment, or personnel (at least 20,000 euros per person per year).

✅A new expedited border procedure will be introduced to prevent those unlikely to win asylum from lingering inside the bloc for years.

✅Shortened deadlines will apply, with failed asylum applicants being sent away within six months.

✅The expedited procedure will also apply to those deemed dangerous, uncooperative, or from countries with low asylum recognition rates in the EU.

✅The goal is to restart cooperation among EU countries to distribute the task of caring for arriving refugees and migrants more evenly.

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🔆EUs new pact on Migration and Asylum

📍Key Features of the New Pact:

✅Each EU country will be assigned a share of the 30,000 people the bloc expects to accommodate at any given time, based on GDP, population, border crossings, and more.

✅Countries unwilling to accept people can provide support to hosting peers through cash, equipment, or personnel (at least 20,000 euros per person per year).

✅A new expedited border procedure will be introduced to prevent those unlikely to win asylum from lingering inside the bloc for years.

✅Shortened deadlines will apply, with failed asylum applicants being sent away within six months.

✅The expedited procedure will also apply to those deemed dangerous, uncooperative, or from countries with low asylum recognition rates in the EU.

✅The goal is to restart cooperation among EU countries to distribute the task of caring for arriving refugees and migrants more evenly.

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🔆Indian Ocean Commission

✅The IOC is an intergovernmental organisation founded in 1982 comprises five small-island states in the Western Indian Ocean: the Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Réunion (a French department), and Seychelles.

✅The IOC has its own regional agenda, and has made impressive headway in the design and implementation of a regional maritime security architecture in the Western Indian Ocean.

✅Over the years, the IOC has emerged as an active and trusted regional actor, working in and for the Western Indian Ocean and implementing a range of projects.

✅For example, in 2012, the IOC was one of the four regional organisations to launch the MASE Programme.

✅MASE programme is the European Union-funded programme to promote Maritime Security in Eastern and Southern Africa and Indian Ocean.

✅Under MASE, the IOC has established a mechanism for surveillance and control of the Western Indian Ocean with two regional centres.

✅The Regional Maritime Information Fusion Center (RMIFC), based in Madagascar, is designed to deepen maritime domain awareness by monitoring maritime activities and promoting information sharing and exchange.

✅The Regional Coordination Operations Centre (RCOC), based in Seychelles, will eventually facilitate joint or jointly coordinated interventions at sea based on information gathered through the RMIFC.

✅These centres are a response to the limitations that the states in the region face in policing and patrolling their often enormous Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs).

✅Bottom-up Regionalism
The IOC style of ‘bottom-up regionalism’ has produced a sub-regional view and definition of maritime security problems and local ownership of pathways towards workable solutions

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🔆EUs new pact on Migration and Asylum

📍Key Features of the New Pact:

✅Each EU country will be assigned a share of the 30,000 people the bloc expects to accommodate at any given time, based on GDP, population, border crossings, and more.

✅Countries unwilling to accept people can provide support to hosting peers through cash, equipment, or personnel (at least 20,000 euros per person per year).

✅A new expedited border procedure will be introduced to prevent those unlikely to win asylum from lingering inside the bloc for years.

✅Shortened deadlines will apply, with failed asylum applicants being sent away within six months.

✅The expedited procedure will also apply to those deemed dangerous, uncooperative, or from countries with low asylum recognition rates in the EU.

✅The goal is to restart cooperation among EU countries to distribute the task of caring for arriving refugees and migrants more evenly.

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🔆Significance of Bhutan China boundary talks

✅China and Bhutan held their
25th round of boundary talks
and signed a Cooperation
Agreement related to the
demarcation of the
Bhutan­China border.

✅Bhutan­ China border dispute
primarily concerns the Doklam
plateau and the India­ China­ Bhutan trijunction,
as well as the Jakarlung and
Pasamlung valleys.

✅The 3­Step Roadmap initiated
in 2021 aims to clearly
delineate the Bhutanese and
Chinese territories, involving
discussions at the table, on­site
visits, and formal demarcation.

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🔆Israel Lists Lashkar-E-Taiba As A Terror Organisation

✅Israel has listed Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) as a terror organisation to symbolise the marking of 15th year of
commemoration of the 26/11 Mumbai attacks.

✅Israel’s move comes at a time when it has asked India to proscribe Hamas as a terrorist outfit.

✅Experts view this step as a part of Israel’s global diplomatic campaign to isolate Hamas.

✅The listing has been done by Israel on its own, without any request from India.

✅ Designation is done based on specific criteria and can attract a range of curbs, including the freezing of assets and the takeover of the properties of the designated organisation.

📍India’s Stand On Hamas

✅Background - India’s policy towards terrorism

✅India designates a group as a terrorist organisation under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA).

✅The UAPA was amended in 2019 to include the provision of designating an individual as a terrorist.

✅As of February 2023, there were a total of 44 designated terrorist organisations under the 1st Schedule of the Act.

📌The last major international organisation banned by India was ISIS in 2015.

✅ India’s stand on Hamas
🔰So far, India has not declared Hamas as a terrorist organisation.

📍Why Has India Not Declared Hamas As A Terrorist
Organisation?

✅Balancing act in West Asia
🔰 While it has traditionally supported Palestine and has an old friendship with the Arab world, its ties with
Israel are growing.

✅Significant Muslim population in India
🔰 Support for Palestinians is consistent across Muslim populations, including in India, home to the thirdlargest Muslim population in the world.

✅Very localised requirements to ban an organisation
🔰UAPA has very localised requirements for groups to be added to its terrorism listing.
🔰This includes having activities such as operations, finances, and recruitment within Indian territories where Indian laws are applicable.
🔰Hamas has had no such known history in the country.

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🔆Evolving role of combo security conclave

✅India's National Security Adviser, Ajit Doval, participated in the sixth meeting of the Colombo Security Conclave (CSC), planning a road map for 2024 to ensure a secure Indian Ocean alongside member-states and observer-states.

✅The CSC aims to adapt to the evolving dynamics of the Indian Ocean region, which has grown in strategic significance due to competing extra-regional powers, especially as the Indo-Pacific gains importance.

✅Through the CSC, India seeks to reinforce its historical role in Indian Ocean security by assisting island nations in defense, infrastructure, and responding to crises such as coups, and health or economic emergencies.

✅The revival of CSC is partially a response to China's expanding influence in the Indian Ocean through its Belt and Road Initiative, naval capabilities, defense ties, and controlling strategic ports and sea lines.

✅The CSC has prioritized areas such as maritime safety, counter-terrorism, trafficking, cyber-security, and humanitarian assistance, positioning India as a collaborative leader and responder to regional threats.

✅Domestic politics in member-states impact the CSC's cohesion, as seen with the Maldives' recent absence from a CSC meeting, potentially due to its relations with China or nationalistic policies.

✅The CSC is enhancing security in the Indian Ocean through collaborative efforts on counter-terrorism, narcotics trafficking, marine pollution, maritime law, coastal security, and capacity-building among its members.

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🔆Asia Pacific Plant Protection Commission:

✅It is an intergovernmental organization that promotes cooperation among countries in the Asia-Pacific region to enhance plant health and plant protection.
✅It was established in 1956 as a regional body approved by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.
✅Member Countries: The commission consists of 25 member countries, including India.
✅Structure of the organization: The Commission consists of representatives of all member countries and elects amongst them a Chairperson who serves for a period of two years.
🔸The Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization appoints and provides the secretariat that coordinates, organizes and follows up the work of the Commission.
🔸The Commission, according to its provisions convenes at least once every two years and opens for participation to all member countries.

✅Objectives: The commission coordinates and supports plant protection activities of its Members in Asia and the Pacific, with emphasis on developing regional standards for phytosanitary measures (RSPMs) etc.

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Japan finalises record $54 billion defence budget for fiscal 2024

The approved budget keeps Japan on track to boost military spending by 43 trillion yen over five years as it seeks to bolster defences in a complex security environment with an increasingly assertive China and unpredictable North Korea. The 2024 budget for the year starting April represents an increase of about 17% from the previous year's spending of 6.6 trillion yen

It includes over 200 billion yen to strengthen cyber capability as well as funding to start building ballistic missile defence warships with Aegis combat systems, the defence ministry said, estimating the cost per vessel at about 400 billion yen.

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