The Pulse | Diplomacy | South Asia

The Indian Ocean Has Too Many Forums and Too Few Deliverables

Regional forums often celebrate participation, but participation alone is not a policy outcome.

The 9th Indian Ocean Conference was held in Mauritius from April 10 to 12, under the theme “Collective Stewardship for Indian Ocean Governance.” It was an ideal topic at a time when the Indian Ocean is no longer a peaceful maritime space through which oil, containers, fish, data, and naval vessels pass. It has become a space where major powers are asserting themselves, some more violently than others.

The vulnerability of the Indian Ocean to conflicts thousands of miles away was underscored recently when the U.S. Navy sank the Iranian frigate, IRIS Dena, on March 4, and seized Iranian cargo ships close to India and Sri Lanka in late April. These developments, especially the sinking of IRIS Dena have prompted questions about the capacity and willingness of regional institutions to respond to these vulnerabilities.

The Indian Ocean Region does not lack institutions. Countries in South Asia, for example, came together in the 1980s to form the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). But it never got off the ground because of the rivalry between India and Pakistan.

In the past decade, several institutions related to the Indian Ocean were established, with India’s blessings, which sought to build regional institutions that excluded Pakistan.

The Indian Ocean Conference emerged as a major Track 1.5 platform. The Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) was established as an intergovernmental forum. The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) links South and Southeast Asia around the Bay of Bengal. The Colombo Security Conclave focuses on maritime security. The Indian Ocean Naval Symposium, the Quad’s maritime initiatives, information fusion centers, and various bilateral and minilateral arrangements add further layers to the architecture.

These have been established to face the diverse threats to the region, including piracy, illegal fishing, narcotics trafficking, marine pollution, maritime disasters, debt distress, climate change, undersea cable vulnerability, and disruptions at chokepoints such as the Strait of Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb, and the Red Sea.

But the multiplication of institutions has not translated into stronger protection; if anything, smaller states like Sri Lanka are more vulnerable than ever to all the above-mentioned threats, as well as to extra-regional actors.

For decades, Sri Lanka has turned to regional institutions as a way of preserving autonomy, balancing India, expanding economic options, and avoiding overdependence on any single power. SAARC once promised a rules-based South Asian order that could give smaller states a collective voice. BIMSTEC later offered a way to bypass the India-Pakistan deadlock and connect Sri Lanka to Southeast Asia. The IORA appeared even more relevant because it placed maritime security, the blue economy, fisheries, disaster risk management, and climate adaptation at the center of regional cooperation. Yet, none of these has lived up to their promise.

For smaller South Asian states, SAARC’s original attraction lay in the possibility of creating a strong regional institution that allowed the region to negotiate and forward its interests on the international stage. But its development was stymied from the beginning due to the India-Pakistan rivalry. SAARC has not held a heads-of-state summit since 2014. Intra-regional trade in South Asia remains low as both the South Asian Preferential Trade Agreement (SAPTA) and the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) have not been fully implemented.

BIMSTEC evoked much hope in South Asia as it brings together South and Southeast Asian states. Its agenda, i.e., trade, technology, energy, transport, tourism, and fisheries, aligns closely........

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