In a historic first, Commander of Royal Saudi Land Forces Lieutenant General Fahd Bin Abdullah Mohammed Al-Mutair is visiting India this week.
The three-day visit is the first ever by a Saudi Land forces Chief to India and is a testament of the growing bilateral defence ties between New Delhi and Riyadh. New areas of cooperation are being mutually identified to include Intelligence Sharing, Counter Terrorism, Artificial Intelligence and Cyber Security.
On Tuesday, the Chief of Army Staff General MM Naravane held dialogue with the Saudi Land forces Commander. The visit is seemingly important due to the warm personal relations shared between the two Army Chiefs. Building on the visit of Chief of Indian Army in December 2020 to Saudi Arabia, both Army chiefs had regular telephonic exchanges to monitor the progress of mutually agreed roadmap of bilateral relations, sources said.
The defence relations between the two countries have seen an upswing in the last year with a series of high-level interactions and the first bilateral Naval exercise “Al Mohed-Al Hindi” conducted in August 2021 on the Eastern Coast of the Kingdom at Jubail.
Despite COVID induced travel restrictions, officers from both the Royal Saudi Armed Forces and Indian Armed Forces are undergoing training in the various military institutes of the two countries.
