Myanmar has allowed China to set up a monitoring and surveillance facility on the Coco Islands in the Bay of Bengal. India has expressed serious concern over this. From here, China wants to track India’s missiles launched from the Balasore test range in Odisha and strategic assets on the eastern seaboard south of Visakhapatnam. India has taken up the Coco Islands issue with the Myanmar government headed by General Min Aung Hlaing and is not satisfied with the answers received from Naypyidaw.
Prima facie, Myanmar’s military rulers have denied that China had any role in extending runways, constructing shelters, setting up monitoring stations or infrastructure development in the Coco Islands, reports Hindustan Times. The Myanmar junta is wary of China but has no option but to side with Beijing. After the 2021 coup, where the West declared the military rule untouchable, China supported it.
Wants To Build China-Myanmar-Bangladesh Corridor
China has given four billion dollars in aid to Myanmar. It also tries to include Myanmar and Bangladesh in the Belt and Road Initiative to create a China-Myanmar-Bangladesh corridor to establish supremacy in the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean.
According to the report, National Security Planners and available satellite images show that the runway on Coco Island has been expanded, and new sheds/barracks have been constructed with about 1500 military personnel.
India Worried About China’s Antics
Defense Minister George Fernandes, in the government of former Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee, was the first to highlight the presence of Chinese espionage in Coco. India is concerned about spying on the movement of its nuclear submarines at its newly built naval base at Rambilly, just 50 km from Visakhapatnam. India’s ballistic missile-firing submarines are present on its eastern board.
