India and Liberia Launch 'Group of Friends' to Protect Shipping and Seafarers

India and Liberia have joined forces to establish a "group of friends" focused on the safety and security of shipping and seafarers, launching the initiative on the sidelines of the 81st United Nations General Assembly. The announcement came during a ministerial-level meeting of the new grouping, which aims to spotlight the growing risks facing commercial vessels and those who crew them.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar, speaking at the meeting, said India's role as a major supplier of seafarers and Liberia's position as the world's largest shipping registry made the partnership a natural one. "India, as a major source of seafarers, and Liberia, as the largest shipping registry, have come together to highlight the safety and security of shipping and seafarers," he said.

Jaishankar listed a series of recent attacks on commercial shipping and marinas, noting with concern that such incidents are no longer rare. "In the last few months, commercial shipping and marinas have been subjected to repeated attacks in the Gulf, the Red Sea, and its vicinity," he said. "These actions that disrupt maritime commerce and cost innocent lives are simply indefensible."

The minister's remarks underscore a broader worry: merchant shipping and seafarers now face heightened dangers across multiple maritime zones, including the Strait of Hormuz, the Gulf of Oman, the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, the Bab-el-Mandeb, the Black Sea, and waters off Somalia. A large number of Indian seafarers work aboard both Indian-flagged and foreign-flagged vessels that operate in or transit these areas, putting them directly in harm's way.

In a separate exchange at the UN, Jaishankar pushed back sharply when a Pakistani journalist shouted a question accusing his government of sponsoring terrorism. "A terrorist country is asking me that question. Come on," he responded. India's Permanent Representative to the UN, Harish Parvathaneni, told the journalist that the reply had been delivered "loud and clear." The confrontation followed an incident the previous day, when an Indian journalist asked Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, upon his arrival at the UN building, when his country would stop harbouring terrorists.