(PTI)
India and Vietnam on Wednesday inked a vision document to further broad-base the scope and scale of bilateral defence cooperation after Defence Minister Rajnath Singh held “fruitful” talks with his Vietnamese counterpart General Phan Van Giang. The defence minister arrived in Vietnam on Tuesday on a three-day visit.
“Had an excellent meeting with General Phan Van Giang, the Defence Minister of Vietnam. We renewed interactions on expanding bilateral cooperation. Our close Defence and Security cooperation is an important factor of stability in the Indo-Pacific region,” Singh tweeted. The joint vision document provides for significant expansion of defence ties in diverse areas by 2030, officials said.
“We had wide-ranging discussions on effective and practical initiatives to further expand bilateral Defence engagements and regional and global issues,” Singh said. “After our fruitful deliberations, we signed the Joint Vision Statement on India-Vietnam Defence Partnership towards 2030 , which will significantly enhance the scope and scale of our defence cooperation,” he added .The signing of the vision document to expand bilateral defence and security ties came amid growing congruence between the two countries in the maritime security domain amid China’s increasing muscle-flexing in the region.
