Relevance : GS Paper II (International Relations)
[900 words reduced to 200]
- India’s relations with Gulf countries have considerably improved:
- growing volumes of energy imports
- substantive investments from the Gulf
- there are 7 million Indian migrant workers in the region
- Gulf is among India’s top trading partners.
- high-level engagement between has blossomed
- growing security cooperation, especially on counter-terrorism
- Increasing defence cooperation.
- The roadblocks:
- India’s too strong focus on the bilateral relations
- Delhi is paying too little attention to the growing weight of the Gulf in regional affairs
- Significance of Gulf nations
- Saudi Arabia has played a critical role in shaping the world energy markets
- The UAE has become a small but important cosmopolitan centre.
- construction of a moderate Arab centre envisaged by UAE is very much in India’s interest
- growing impact of the Gulf countries in the Indian Ocean region.
- recent success of the UAE and Saudi Arabia in brokering peace between Ethiopia and
- Eritrea
- shaping the geopolitics of their neighbouring regions.
- eager to collaborate with India on development and strategic infrastructure
- taking greater responsibility for managing the regional order
- India needs an integrated regional strategy to secure its ever-rising stakes in the Middle East and the Western Indian Ocean.
