{"id":34480,"date":"2022-11-27T10:21:02","date_gmt":"2022-11-27T04:51:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=34480"},"modified":"2025-04-20T14:12:57","modified_gmt":"2025-04-20T08:42:57","slug":"china-holds-its-first-meeting-with-19-countries-in-indian-ocean-region-without-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/china-holds-its-first-meeting-with-19-countries-in-indian-ocean-region-without-india\/","title":{"rendered":"China Holds Its First Meeting With 19 Countries in Indian Ocean Region Without India"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) \u2013 About, pillars, significance<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>News Summary<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Why In News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Recently, China convened a first \u201cChina-Indian Ocean Region Forum\u201d bringing together 19 countries from the region.<\/li>\n<li>Experts believe that the Chinese forum apparently is aimed at countering India\u2019s strong influence in the Indian Ocean region where India-backed organisations like the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) have taken strong roots.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>IORA<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>IORA is an inter-governmental organisation which was established in March 1997.\n<ul>\n<li>It was formerly known as the Indian Ocean Rim Initiative and the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation (IOR-ARC).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The IORA Secretariat is based in Mauritius. It became an observer to the UN General Assembly and the African Union in 2015.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Members<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 It has 23 Member States and 9 Dialogue Partners.\n<ul>\n<li><u>China is a dialogue partner in the IORA<\/u>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Objectives<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>To promote sustainable growth and balanced development of the region;<\/li>\n<li>To focus on those areas of economic cooperation which provide maximum opportunities for development, shared interest and mutual benefits;<\/li>\n<li>To promote liberalisation, remove impediments and lower barriers towards a freer and enhanced flow of goods, services, investment, and technology within the Indian Ocean rim.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Priority Pillars<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/media\/editor_images\/2022\/11\/27\/12\/32\/47\/63830b97cd651e05bbe3c434_OI.PNG\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<h2><strong>Significance<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The IOR has always made significant contributions to the world economy.<\/li>\n<li>The region is home to 35% of the world\u2019s population and also accounts for 19% of total GDP<\/li>\n<li>Moreover, 80% of seaborne trade uses routes through the Indian Ocean.<\/li>\n<li>Furthermore, 80% of seaborne oil trade and 100,000 commercial vessels depend on this route every year.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>News Summary<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA) held a meeting of the\u00a0<strong>China-Indian Ocean Region Forum<\/strong>\u00a0on Development Cooperation.\n<ul>\n<li>CIDCA is an organisation connected with the Chinese Foreign Ministry.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The meeting was attended by 19 countries from the region \u2013 and all of India\u2019s neighbours, except for India itself.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Key highlights<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Theme<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>The meeting was held in a hybrid manner under the theme of \u201cShared Development: Theory and Practice from the Perspective of the Blue Economy\u201d.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Participating countries<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Participating countries included &#8211; Indonesia, Pakistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Maldives, Nepal, Afghanistan, Iran, Oman, South Africa, Kenya, Mozambique, Tanzania, Seychelles, Madagascar, Mauritius, Djibouti, Australia and representatives of 3 international organisations were present.<\/li>\n<li>India was not invited.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Marine disaster prevention and mitigation cooperation mechanism<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>China proposed to establish a marine disaster prevention and mitigation cooperation mechanism between China and countries in the Indian Ocean region.<\/li>\n<li>China expressed its willingness to provide necessary financial, material, and technical support to countries in need.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>China is looking to increase its presence in IOR<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>China is contending for influence in the strategic Indian Ocean region with substantial investments in ports and infrastructure in several countries.<\/li>\n<li>China has established a full-fledged naval base in Djibouti, its first outside the country.<\/li>\n<li>It has acquired the Hambantota port in Sri Lanka on a 99-year lease besides building the port at Pakistan\u2019s Gwadar in the Arabian Sea opposite India\u2019s western coast.<\/li>\n<li>China has also invested in infrastructure of the Maldives.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>India\u2019s presence in IOR<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>India has strong influence in the Indian Ocean region where India-backed organisations like the IORA have taken strong roots.<\/li>\n<li>PM Modi has proposed \u201cSecurity and Growth for All in the Region\u201d (SAGAR) in 2015 for active cooperation among the littoral countries of the Indian Ocean region.<\/li>\n<li>The Indian Navy-backed \u2018Indian Ocean Naval Symposium\u2019 (IONS) seeks to increase maritime cooperation among navies of the region.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Indian Ocean Rim Association is an organisation consisting of 23 states bordering the Indian Ocean.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":34481,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-34480","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}