‘India is natural leader of Quad in Indo-Pacific region,’ says Australian High Commissioner

Australian High Commissioner Barry O’Farrell says defence exercise MILAN demonstrates cooperation across countries in the region

India is clearly the natural leader in the region in terms of the vision the Quad signs up to in the Indo-Pacific region, and the multi-nation defence exercise, MILAN, held in Vishakapatnam demonstrates the cooperation across countries in the Indo-Pacific, Australian High Commissioner to India, Barry O’Farrell said.

“The exercise Milan where 14 countries, including Australia, took part, demonstrates the co-operation across countries in the Indo-Pacific to secure a free, open and prosperous Indo-Pacific. In terms of the vision the Quad signs up to with relation to the Indo-Pacific, India is clearly the natural leader in the region. The good news is that all four countries [India, Australia, USA and Japan] are working together, whether it is on vaccine rollout, disaster relief and other issues like climate change,” Mr. Farrell told The Hindu.

He said there were four bright spots in the relationship between India and Australia — defence, economic issues, education and tourism. With Australia opening up its borders from February 21, Mr. Farrell said the country expected a significant number of Indians to travel to Australia.

“Before COVID-19, Indian tourists were the fastest growing source of tourism to Australia and Australian tourism to India was increasing. Given that our country was locked up till two weeks ago… Australians are great travellers, I think we can see over this coming months and beyond, an increasing number of Australian travellers coming here [to India]. They include some of the diaspora who have settled in Australia coming and visiting their families here,” he said.

He said a third of the students who had returned to Australia to continue or complete their education following COVID-19 lockdowns were from India. “Now anybody with a visa is able to travel to and from Australia. They only have to be double vaccinated, either with Covishield or Covaxin,” he said.