India And Africa To Strengthen Defence Ties With First-Ever Army Chief Conclave And AFINDEX-2023 Military Exercise

In a first, the India-Africa Army Chief Conclave will be held in Pune from 28 March, reported The Indian Express.

Additionally, the second edition of the Africa-India Exercise (AFINDEX-2023) will be held between 21 March to 29 March and will be attended by 20 countries.

The Indian Express reports that 22 Army Chiefs and representatives from 12 countries will attend the conclave, which will also see an address by the Indian Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.

Army Chiefs of Congo, Niger, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Uganda, Seychelles, Gambia, Tanzania and Kenya will attend the conclave hosted by the Indian Army Chief General Manoj Pande.

The objectives of the conclave and the military exercises are to foster stronger India-Africa relations and management of security crises and conflicts with a collaborative approach and enhancing peace and security.

The report quotes an official saying “Learning from the African experience in cooperative security, management of security crisis situations and conflicts, and promoting a collaborative approach in capacity enhancement of African armies are among the objectives”.

The IE reports says that the conclave will happen in two sessions with the first session exploring the key pillars of the India-Africa defence partnership and the second session will focus on the Indian defence industry’s outreach to Africa.

The military exercise, the IE report further says will have four phases. The first phase will involve training, while the second and the third phase will involve humanitarian mine action and a peacekeeping operations phase.

The last phase will be a test to assess the participants' performance which will also be witnessed by the various Army Chiefs.

Both these events will help India boost ties with African nations — which might also see these nations becoming a major market for Indian Defence equipment.