Udai Bhanu Singh replies: ASEAN Centrality means that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) must be in the driver’s seat and be responsible for formulating a common vision and implementing it. New Delhi has consistently maintained its support for ASEAN Centrality. India’s Indo-Pacific strategy works in tandem with its Act East Policy, with ASEAN Centrality as its basis.
The recent Joint Statement issued after the Quad Foreign Ministers’ meeting in Melbourne indicates the grouping’s drive towards institutionalisation and coming close to achieving a concrete mandate for its existence.
The BrahMos deal with the Philippines marks a convergence between India’s Act East and Defence Export policies and adds to its profile as a reliable defence partner in the Indo-Pacific.
The Indo-Pacific construct has significantly enhanced the strategic salience of both India and Australia in a multipolar region. While the two nations have considerably deepened their strategic partnership, there is scope for much more improvement in several sectors.
Given Myanmar’s geostrategic significance and the continuing insurgency threat, disturbances in Myanmar pose a direct and serious policy challenge to India. A calculated realistic approach weighing the evolving ground situation alone will deliver the objectives of India’s foreign policy.
A larger exchange of defence business between India and Southeast Asia may consolidate India’s position in the regional security architecture, and also forge greater political alignment with important ASEAN partners.
Prior to 1995 when Vietnam joined ASEAN and normalized relationship with the United States, the overriding concern was security as could be well explained by realism. Vietnam has made several critical, strategic moves since 1995 and by 2030 the country may be able to act internationally as an emerging middle power.
Showing readiness to sign the SEANWFZ treaty seems to be a low-cost, high-return proposition for Beijing. It could be a calculated symbolic gesture having no bearing on the region’s precarious security situation.
The 18th ASEAN–India Summit reaffirmed commitment to shared values and norms that underlie ASEAN–India Dialogue relationship that started in 1992, i.e., the commitment to support ASEAN Community building and strengthening the ASEAN–India strategic partnership across the whole spectrum of political-security, economic, socio-cultural and development cooperation.
China’s Response to Indo-Pacific Economic Framework
Beijing’s pushback against the Washington-backed Indo-Pacific Economic Framework is likely to result in an intense regional geo-economic competition.