Truss: UK is building new security ties with partners in Indo-Pacific and Gulf
THE UK is deepening its links with fellow democracies such as India, Israel, Indonesia and South Africa, British prime minister Liz Truss told world leaders at the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York last week.
On her first foreign trip as prime minister to New York, Truss also called on like-minded democracies to be firm against “autocratic regimes”.
“We are building new partnerships around the world. We are fortifying our deep security alliances in Europe and beyond through NATO and the Joint Expeditionary Force,” Truss said last Wednesday (21).
“We are deepening our links with fellow democracies like India, Israel, Indonesia and South Africa,” she said, adding that the UK is building new security ties with its friends in the Indo-Pacific and the Gulf.
She said the UK has shown leadership on free and fair trade, striking trade agreements with Australia, New Zealand, Japan and many others, and “we are in the process” of acceding to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
“Rather than exerting influence through debt, aggression, and taking control of critical infrastructure and minerals, we are building strategic ties based on mutual benefit and trust. And we are deepening partnerships like the G7 and the Commonwealth,” she said.
In separate remarks, British foreign secretary James Cleverly said India’s prime minister Narendra Modi has a “powerful, influential” voice on the world stage and hoped that Rusia’s president Vladimir Putin listens to those voices who are calling for peace amid the Ukraine conflict.
Modi told Putin last week on the sidelines of the 22nd meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Uzbekistan’s Samarkand that “today’s era is not of war”.
Cleverly said in an interview, “I think prime minister Modi’s intervention is very, very welcome. And we really hope that Vladimir Putin listens to those voices who are calling for peace and for deescalation. So, we very much welcome prime minister Modi’s intervention.”
He added, “India is an incredibly important and influential country on the world stage. I think with so much turbulence going on in the world, our close partnership and working relationship with India is incredibly important.”