Indian Naval presence in the Red Sea not to allow instability

The Indian Navy has its assets deployed along the Western Coast to protect India's Maritime interests (in the Red sea) and will not allow any "instability", Chief of Naval Staff Admiral R Hari Kumar said

On the situation in the Arabian Sea and Red Sea area, the Navy chief said Indian assets are already deployed in the area for two anti-piracy operations. He was speaking to the media on the sidelines of the fourth edition of the Global Artificial Intelligence Summit here.

"We are deployed to ensure that our national interest in the Maritime domain is protected. We have our own deployments. We have two ongoing anti-piracy operations there and anti-drone support for merchant shipping," the Navy chief said.

The job of the Navy is to ensure that we preserve, protect and pursue our national interest in the maritime domain. That is what we are doing. Anti-piracy operations have been going on since 2008. We have deployed more than 106 ships since then on a continuous basis," he said.

"Operation Sankalp is happening close to the Gulf of Aden and Gulf of Oman. We had witnessed that till last year, piracy had reduced almost to zero. But subsequently, we saw a resurgence... We have deployed an adequate number of assets. We are not going to allow any piracy to happen," Kumar said. No attacks have happened on Indian merchant ships.

"Whatever disturbance is happening, there has been no attack on any Indian-flagged merchant vessel. Last time they attempted piracy attack on a ship with a high number of Indian crew, our assets were deployed immediately, (and) we responded," the admiral said. "Our message is that we are not going to permit any instability or insecurity happening," he added.

The remarks came amid increasing global concerns over Houthi militants targeting various cargo vessels in the Red Sea against the backdrop of the Israel-Hamas conflict.