Indian Navy Chief Meets SL Defence Top Brass

Chief of Naval Staff of the Indian Navy, Admiral Dinesh K. Tripathi, who is on an official visit to Sri Lanka, paid courtesy calls on Deputy Minister of Defence Major General Aruna Jayasekara (Retd) and Defence Secretary Air Vice Marshal Sampath Thuyacontha (Retd) today (22 September) in two separate meetings.

Admiral Tripathi first met the Deputy Minister of Defence at his office in Colombo this morning, where he was warmly received by the Deputy Minister. Their discussions focused on matters of mutual interest, including strengthening defence diplomacy and bilateral cooperation, enhancing humanitarian assistance and disaster response, combating illegal activities and non-traditional maritime security threats such as drug trafficking, human smuggling, and other maritime crimes in the Indian Ocean Region, expanding training and capacity-building initiatives, improving maritime domain awareness, and promoting regional maritime safety and security.

In the afternoon, the visiting Navy Chief called on the Defence Secretary at the Ministry of Defence in Sri Jayawardanapura, Kotte. During the cordial meeting, both officials discussed a range of bilateral issues, with emphasis on strengthening military to military ties, expanding training opportunities, working towards stability in the Indina Ocean Region with collaboration and joint activities, curbing Illegal Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing activities, information sharing and enhancing defence diplomacy between Sri Lanka and India.