India says missile cooperation with Indonesia aims to boost self-reliance

Jakarta (ANTARA) - The Indian government has stated that cooperation on BrahMos and air-to-air missiles with Indonesia aims to enhance the self-reliance and defence capabilities of both countries based on indigenously developed systems. “BrahMos and air-to-air missiles are new areas of our collaboration. The benefit is clear: we become self-reliant, we develop our own capabilities based on systems we own and master,” said Rudrendra Tandon, Secretary (East) at India’s Ministry of External Affairs, during a press conference in Jakarta on Tuesday evening. Tandon said the cooperation on BrahMos supersonic cruise missiles and air-to-air missiles is a new focus for elevating bilateral relations to a higher level, while implementing the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership agreed upon by the two developing nations. “We are both developing countries. We have decided to collaborate to help each other. This is part of defence collaboration, and it is very much embedded in the comprehensive strategic partnership that we have,” Tandon said. While underscoring the importance of defence cooperation through military procurement, Tandon noted that discussions at the head-of-state level focused on areas of collaboration, not the details of commercial deals. He explained that the details of the commercial agreements would be handled by the respective parties, namely BrahMos Aerospace with Indonesia’s Ministry of Defence for the BrahMos system, and Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL) with Republikorp for the air-to-air missiles. “The commercial agreements were not actually discussed at the highest level. Those matters are left to the respective companies to finalise. However, I can tell you that these are important areas of collaboration, and there were in-depth discussions about them,” Tandon revealed. The procurement contract for the BrahMos supersonic cruise missiles between BrahMos Aerospace and Indonesia’s Ministry of Defence was announced in the presence of President Prabowo Subianto and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the latter’s state visit at the Merdeka Palace in Jakarta on Tuesday. The defence cooperation on the procurement of BrahMos and air-to-air missiles was part of a total of 16 cooperation documents announced during the state visit. In a joint statement with President Prabowo at the Merdeka Palace’s Credential Room, Prime Minister Modi affirmed India’s commitment to enhancing cooperation with Indonesia in various fields, including defence, disaster management, and security, particularly in the Indian Ocean region.