New Delhi: China’s enemy countries are continuously strengthening their friendship with India these days so that they can give a befitting reply to Beijing if needed. In such a situation, China is getting upset. During the recent Quad conference in Japan, India, America, Japan and Australia expressed commitment to strengthen security and military cooperation to end China’s bullying from the South China Sea to the Indo-Pacific region, even then China got upset. It accused Japan of working against Beijing in collaboration with India-America. Now Vietnam’s Prime Minister Pham Minh’s meeting with PM Narendra Modi today must have increased China’s concern manifold.

The reason is clear that there is a lot of enmity between China and Vietnam. The biggest reason for the dispute between the two countries is the South China Sea. India has already gifted warships to Vietnam to deal with Chinese challenges. Now the strategy that India has made to strengthen Vietnam will rob Xi Jinping of his sleep. PM Modi today held wide-ranging talks with his Vietnamese counterpart Pham Minh Chinh that focused on further expanding the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries. Chinh arrived in Delhi on Tuesday night on a three-day visit aimed at further expanding the comprehensive strategic ties between the two countries.

South China Sea in focus

“Prime Minister Narendra Modi extended a warm welcome to the Prime Minister of Vietnam Pham Minh Chinh at Hyderabad House,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal posted on X. “Substantive discussions to further expand the India-Vietnam comprehensive strategic partnership are on the agenda,” he said ahead of the talks. Strategic ties between India and Vietnam have deepened in the past few years. In July last year, India gifted its in-service missile corvette INS Kirpan to Vietnam, reflecting the growing bilateral strategic and defence partnership amid shared concerns over China’s increasingly aggressive behaviour in the South China Sea. This was the first time India handed over a fully operational warship to a friendly foreign country.