- India
- Jul 17
- Sreesha V.M
New Delhi hosts 5th meeting of BIMSTEC national security chiefs
• The fifth meeting of BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation) national security chiefs was held in New Delhi on July 16.
• The BIMSTEC Secretary General Indra Mani Pandey presented a comprehensive overview of the status of cooperation in the security sector and briefed the member states on the progress made across a wide range of sectors.
• During the meeting, they adopted guidelines for the maritime component of humanitarian assistance and disaster relief.
• These guidelines will help BIMSTEC member states to undertake relief operations in the region in an expeditious manner.
• They also endorsed a set of guiding principles on the conduct of maritime law enforcement agencies during interactions at sea.
• As BIMSTEC approaches its thirtieth anniversary in 2027, they reiterated their resolve to further enhance collaboration and knowledge-sharing towards strengthening regional security, building resilience, and enhancing institutional capacities to address diverse security threats.
• BIMSTEC bridges South Asia and Southeast Asia, two of the most significant and vibrant regions of the Indian Ocean.
• Over the years, BIMSTEC has deepened cooperation in regional security, disaster management, transport and trade connectivity, technological issues, and people-to-people contacts.
What is BIMSTEC?
• The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) comprises India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Bhutan and Nepal.
• It is a regional bloc comprising seven countries lying in the littoral and adjacent areas of the Bay of Bengal constituting a contiguous regional unity.
• This sub-regional organisation came into being on June 6, 1997 through the Bangkok Declaration. It constitutes five countries from South Asia (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka) and two from Southeast Asia (Myanmar and Thailand).
• Initially, the economic bloc was formed with four member states with the acronym BIST-EC (Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Thailand Economic Cooperation). Following the inclusion of Myanmar on December 22, 1997 during a special ministerial meeting in Bangkok, the group was renamed BIMSTEC (Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand Economic Cooperation).
• With the admission of Nepal and Bhutan at the sixth ministerial meeting in February 2004, the name of the grouping was changed to Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC).
• The BIMSTEC region is home to about 1.8 billion people, accounting for about 22 per cent of the global population with a combined GDP of $4.5 trillion.
• The BIMSTEC Secretariat is situated in Dhaka.
• India has been pushing for making BIMSTEC a vibrant forum as various regional initiatives under South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) were not moving forward primarily due to non-cooperation from Pakistan.
• For India, BIMSTEC is a natural choice to take forward key foreign policy priorities like ‘Neighbourhood First’ and ‘Act East’ as the bloc enjoys the strength of connecting South and Southeast Asia.
• Initially, six sectors — trade, technology, energy, transport, tourism and fisheries — were included for sectoral cooperation. It was later expanded to 14 areas of cooperation.
(The author is a trainer for Civil Services aspirants.)