With the Strait of Hormuz under strain, the Malacca Strait has emerged as the world’s most strategically significant maritime chokepoint, reshaping Indo-Pacific security, trade and great-power competition

The ship tracker in Kota Kinabalu, where I am — on the eastern edge of Malaysia — shows that 281 ships passed through the Malacca Strait on July 14, compared with 134 ships which used to cross the Strait of Hormuz daily before the blockade. Four countries — Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore — monitor and regulate traffic across the Malacca Strait. Before its twin blockades by the US and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz was free for international passage. Iran has found it can use the choke point as leverage and even impose tariffs. As I write, the issue over passage rights remains unresolved despite tit-for-tat bombings and a fragile ceasefire. Not since the Suez Canal crisis of 1956, which led to a geopolitical tsunami, has another choke point rediscovered its importance.

The 900 km long and 65 km wide Strait of Malacca is flanked by Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia, with which PM Modi signed a landmark BrahMos deal this week; it carries 24 per cent of global sea borne trade, 45 per cent of sea borne oil and 23 per cent of cargo shipments, and contains the world’s most critical port infrastructure: Singapore’s Port Klang, which is the world’s second busiest container hub, one of the busiest container trans-shipment points and the world’s largest ship refuelling hub. That the Malacca Strait remains free of disruption is critical for China, the US, India and Japan especially, and ASEAN; notably for the four custodian states, for whom control or leverage over it is necessary. They have been working on keeping the South China Sea and the........

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