DHAKA : India, Bangladesh agree to strengthen defence ties

DHAKA : India and Bangladesh on Thursday agreed to further step up their bilateral defence ties, with greater military-to-military engagements, capacity-building and defence-industrial cooperation.

This was decided during the 4th India-Bangladesh annual defence dialogue (ADD), co-chaired by defence secretary Ajay Kumar and the principal staff officer of Bangladesh’s armed forces division Lt-General Waker-Uz-Zaman.

The Indian armed forces are working towards “building capacity’’ of the Bangladesh military, which ranges from training and exercises to military supplies and defence technologies. Bangladesh, of course, is another country in India’s neighbourhood where China has made strategic inroads over the last many years.

“The AAD covered the existing bilateral exercises and training, with the two sides agreeing to increase the complexity of these exercises. ,” a defence ministry official said.