INDIA-INDONESIA BILATERAL COOPERATION: A STUDY ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF MARITIME DIPLOMACY PRACTICES OF INDIA AND INDONESIA IN THE INDO-PACIFIC REGION (2016- 2022)

Abstract

The Indo-Pacific Region (IPR) gained momentum as an important region for international politics and the world's economic lifelines of the 21st century. As the coastal states, India and Indonesia strongly rely on Indo-Pacific's seaborne trade and SLOCs to transport goods, energy resources, and commodities throughout the region. Making the two leaders, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Joko Widodo, explore the convergence of common strategic interests between India's AEP and Indonesia's GMF in the region. Thus, as India and Indonesia recently established maritime cooperation under the new elevated Comprehensive Strategic Partnership's framework, this research study discusses how India and Indonesia implemented bilateral cooperation on maritime diplomacy in the Indo-Pacific Region from 2016 to 2022 with the conceptual framework of Maritime Diplomacy proposed by Christian Le Mière. This study uses qualitative methods with library research and in-depth personal interviews for data collection techniques. This research study found two leading maritime agencies representing India and Indonesia that frequently conduct maritime diplomacy in the Indo-Pacific Region: Navies and the Coast Guards. Based on the data found in this research, from the period 2016 to 2022, both countries implemented cooperative maritime diplomacy practices and carried out all four forms of activities, namely Goodwill Visits, HA/DR, Training and Joint Exercise, and Joint Maritime Security operation.