Goemkarponn desk
BAMBOLIM: Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said that illegal, unreported and unregulated or IUU fishing is a challenge which relates to resource overexploitation.
“In our region, Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated or IUU fishing is a challenge which relates to resource overexploitation. IUU fishing threatens ocean ecosystems and sustainable fishery. It also threatens our economic security and regional and global food security,” said Singh.
He further said that if the threats that we face are supra-national in scope and impact, national efforts to address them would indeed have limited effects.
“The regional challenges can, to the best of my understanding, be managed through multi-national, collaborative mitigation frameworks,” he added.
Singh said that the common maritime priorities such as tackling climate change, controlling piracy, terrorism, drug-trafficking and overfishing, freedom of commerce on high seas, etc. need to be addressed by all of us cooperatively, by avoiding ruinous pursuit of selfish goals which would make the region less secure and less prosperous.
“Since our countries interact with each other repeatedly on a multitude of issues, it is possible to build trust by discussion and consultation, as well as by consistently acting in concert with each other,” Singh added
In fact, Rajnath said that the game theory itself has the theoretical basis of such cooperative, optimal equilibrium, based on the trust developed through repeated interactions.
“We have to work out and agree about our common priorities. A free, open and rules-bound maritime order is a priority for all of us. “Might is right” has no place in such a maritime order. Respect for international maritime laws, as enunciated in the UNCLOS, 1982, must be our lodestar,” he added
