Australia will participate again after more than a decade in the “Malabar” military exercises, together with the United States, India and Japan in November, amid the increase in diplomatic and commercial tensions between Canberra and Beijing.
Maneuvers such as Malabar are “critical to enhancing Australia’s maritime capabilities, creating interoperability with our close partners and demonstrating our collective determination to support an open and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Australian Defense Minister Linda Reynolds said in a statement.
The maneuvers, which began in 1992 as a bilateral activity between Washington and Delhi, bring together four Indo-Pacific powers this year, where concerns persist over the militarization of China and territorial disputes between the countries of the region.
Reynolds, who met her Japanese counterpart Nobuo Kishi in Tokyo on Monday, expressed her “strong opposition to any unilateral coercive or destabilizing action that could alter the status quo or increase tensions in the East China Sea.”
Likewise, the Australian minister indicated that she opposes any attempt to modify the status quo of the South China Sea and reaffirmed the importance of free navigation in the strategic region in military and commercial terms, without openly mentioning Beijing.
The Executive of Canberra believes that participation in Malabar “will strengthen the capacity of India, Australia, Japan and the United States to work together to maintain peace and stability throughout our region,” said Marise Payne, Minister Foreign Ministry of the oceanic country, in the statement with Reynolds.
Australia participated in 2007 for the last time in Malabar, which had been described by Beijing as exercises of an “anti-China coalition”, after strong pressure on the Labor government of Kevin Rudd to maintain relations with the Asian giant, its largest trading partner. .
This year, relations between Beijing and Canberra have been further strained after Australia launched an independent investigation into the origin of the covid-19 pandemic, China for its part has suspended or raised tariffs on several products imported from the country oceanic.
Likewise, recent laws against espionage and interference in domestic affairs in Australia have also contributed to angering Beijing, which maintains a tense relationship with Canberra over issues related to human rights and freedom of the press.
(c) EFE Agency
