India, Japan close in on military pacts as Abe arrives

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj meets Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in New Delhi yesterday.AgenciesNew DelhiIndia and Japan are likely to finalise an agreement on protection of military information during Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s trip that will the lay the ground for Japanese arms sales to India, including seaplanes. Abe, who arrived in New Delhi yesterday, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi have forged close economic and defence ties aimed partly at pushing back against China’s growing assertiveness in the region. Both are embroiled in territorial disputes with China. Officials in Tokyo and New Delhi said the two sides were negotiating a defence technology transfer agreement and another on sharing of military information that are necessary before Japan can sell weapons to India and collaborate on military technology. Japan is aiming to make progress on the two defence pacts during Abe’s three-day visit, a Japanese foreign ministry official said in Tokyo. An Indian defence ministry official said the broad parameters of the framework agreement were in place. India and Japan have been holding talks for two years on the purchase by India of US-2 amphibious aircraft made by ShinMaywa Industries, which will be one of Japan’s first arms sales since Abe lifted a 50-year ban on weapon exports. India wants two of the seaplanes off the shelf and the remaining 10 to be manufactured in India, with an Indian partner, as part of Modi’s push to build a defence industrial base. The Indian defence official said he did not expect the deal, estimated to be worth $1.1bn, to be announced immediately. Abe, making a third trip to India since he became prime minister, pledged stronger maritime ties, also involving its ally, the US, in a three-way relationship that has irked China in the past. “In order to maintain an open, free and peaceful sea, it becomes important more and more for there to be collaboration between Japan and India, as well as the international community including the US,” he said in an article published in the Times of India. Modi’s cabinet this week cleared a $14.7bn Japanese proposal to build a bullet train line between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, giving Japan an early lead over China, which is conducting feasibility studies for high speed trains on other parts of the Indian rail network. Modi has pledged to overhaul India’s ramshackle railways and other infrastructure as part of ambitious reforms to revive the economy. Abe is set to meet Indian business leaders in the capital before taking a tour with Modi today of India’s holiest city of Varanasi and the prime minister’s parliamentary constituency. Before leaving for Delhi, Abe told reporters that relations between Asia’s second and third largest economies harbour great potential. “I want to achieve results that will give a boost to the development of future Japan-India relations in the areas of high speed railways, security co-operation, and an agreement on the peaceful use of nuclear power,” Abe said. Modi and Abe enjoy an unusually close friendship that pre-dates the Indian leader’s election in May last year. Both are right-wing nationalists elected on a platform of kickstarting economic reforms. And both are seen as strong leaders at the helm of nations with separate territorial disputes with China, the dominant regional power. Tokyo and Delhi are wary of China’s growing ambition in the region, and are keen to curb its activity in the East and South China Seas and the Indian Ocean. Modi visited Japan twice as chief minister of prosperous Gujarat and met with Abe both times. He also received a warm welcome in Japan last year, when Abe showed him around the ancient capital of Kyoto, after choosing the country as the destination for his first bilateral visit outside South Asia. “Their schedule reads like a global romance: They met recently in Paris, had dinner in Istanbul, lunch in Kuala Lumpur and now will be together in New Delhi for three days,” the Hindustan Times newspaper wrote yesterday.