India's naval drill with Singapore, Thailand to end today

A three-nation naval military exercise being conducted by India along with Thailand and Singapore in the Andaman Sea will conclude on Friday. The objective of the drill is to test maritime interoperability between the navies of the three countries in the Indian Ocean Region.

The two-day sea phase of the drill - Singapore, India, Thailand Maritime Exercise (SITMEX) - had commenced on Thursday.

Navy officials said three Indian ships including INS Ranvir, a guided missile destroyer; INS Kora, a missile corvette and INS Sumedha, an offshore patrol vessel, are participating in the exercise. India's long-range maritime reconnaissance aircraft P-8I have also been deployed in the exercise.

Other deployments by India include the warships RSS Tenacious, a formidable-class guided missile stealth frigate and HTMS Kraburi, a guided missile frigate.

"Various gunnery, force protection measures, air defence and communication exercises are being conducted. Exercises including compliant cross-boarding operations and surface target shoots have also been conducted," said an official.

In the harbour phase of the exercise, which was held at Port Blair, there were professional interactions between naval crew of the three nations. The interactions included subject matter expert exchanges and pre-sail conferences which were attended by command teams. Sports and a food festival were also organised during the harbour phase of the exercise.IANS