New Delhi: Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Monday held wide-ranging talks with US defence secretary Lloyd Austin focusing on crucial aspects of the India-US defence relationship and the regional security landscape, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region.
“The meeting was warm and cordial. The two sides discussed a substantial range of bilateral defence cooperation issues, with particular focus on identifying ways to strengthen industrial cooperation,” the defence ministry said in a statement.
The US defence secretary arrived in New Delhi on Sunday on a two-day tour that comes over two weeks ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit to Washington.
The two ministers explored ways of building resilient supply chains. Both sides will identify opportunities for co-development of new technologies and co-production of existing and new systems and facilitate increased collaboration between defence start-up ecosystems of the two countries. Towards these objectives, they concluded a roadmap for US-India Defence Industrial Cooperation which shall guide the policy direction for the next few years.
According to the ministry, both sides reviewed the robust and multifaceted bilateral defence cooperation activities and agreed to maintain the momentum of engagement. They welcomed the inaugural dialogues held recently focusing on defence artificial intelligence and defence space. They also discussed the regional security issues given their shared interest in maintaining peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region.
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