India-Iran Relations by Ashwarya Sujata;

Author:Ashwarya, Sujata;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Routledge

It led to the symbolically important visit to New Delhi by King Abdullah in January 2006. As the guest of honour at India’s Republic Day—a privilege usually reserved for India’s friends and allies—it reflected the mutual desire on the part of both the countries to establish solid ties based on shared interests and threats. During the visit, King Abdullah signed the Delhi Declaration, the first such bilateral document ever inked by a Saudi King, which provided a comprehensive road map for bilateral relations. With four additional MoUs/Agreements on investment, double taxation, combatting crime and sports, the declaration of January 27, 2006 committed the two countries to the development of a “strategic energy partnership based on complementarity and interdependence”.117 The reciprocal visit by the then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Saudi Arabia in February 2010 took place at the backdrop of the Mumbai carnage of November 2008 that heightened Saudi and indeed the GCC’s concerns about the instability in Pakistan and its patronage for terrorism outside its borders.

Saudi Arabia took the lead in elevating the bilateral engagement to a “strategic partnership” and the Riyadh Declaration signed during the trip captured the spirit of enhanced cooperation by expanding the definition of such a partnership to include security, economic, defence and political areas.118 The subtitle of the Declaration, ‘A New Era in Strategic Partnership’ captured its immediate achievement that “was intelligence-sharing in regard to extremist elements operating in South Asia and the Arabian Peninsula and enhanced defence cooperation”.119 The visit by Crown Prince Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud (now King) in February 2014 imparted a fresh momentum to the ties between India and Saudi Arabia. The signing of a defence pact that “will allow exchange of defence-related information, military training and education as well as cooperation in areas varying from hydrography and security to logistics” during the Crown Prince’s visit implied that the focus imparted to military ties, during Defence Minister A.K. Antony’s visit to Saudi Arabia in 2012, had been categorically retained. Antony’s visit set out the road map to bilateral defence cooperation in specific areas such as mountain warfare and joint military exercises.120

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