Under shadow of India-Pak tensions, Rajnath to host Japanese Defence minister Nakatani for talks today

New Delhi: Defence Minister Rajnath Singh will host his Japanese counterpart Gen Nakatani for wide-ranging talks on Monday against the backdrop of rising tensions between India and Pakistan over the Pahalgam terror

attack and China’s persistent muscle-flexing in the South China Sea.

The defence ministry said the Indian and the Japanese sides will exchange “views and ideas” on the current regional and international security situation and discuss ways to further deepen the bilateral defence cooperation.

It is expected that the situation that emerged following the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack that killed 26 people will figure in the talks.

The two sides are also expected to deliberate on ways to boost India-Japan defence industrial cooperation.

It will be the second meeting between the two defence ministers within six months after their maiden interaction in November on the sidelines of the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting-Plus at Lao PDR.

At that meeting, Singh and Gen Nakatani deliberated on a reciprocal provision of supply and services agreement for greater interoperability between their militaries.

The reciprocal supply and services pact, if sealed, would provide for the militaries of the two countries to use each other’s bases for repair and replenishment of supplies, besides facilitating the scaling up of overall defence cooperation.

“India and Japan share a long-term friendship, which has further gained qualitative momentum after the elevation of this collaboration to special strategic and global partnership in 2014,” the ministry said ahead of the Singh-Nakatani meeting.

“Defence and security are important pillars of the ties between the two countries,” it said in a statement.

It is learnt that the two sides will also review the situation in the strategic waters of East and South China Seas where Beijing has been increasing its military posturing.