In 2019, France’s interest in the region was codified in key government papers, such as, France’s Defence Strategy in the Indo-Pacific (by the French Ministry for the Armed Forces) and the French Strategy in 1. [...] France’s connection with the region is unique in that it is the only european nation with territories spanning the Indian and Pacific Oceans, from the eastern coast of Africa to the South Pacific and off the western coast of Central America (see table 1). [...] With the global economic centre of gravity shifting from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the Indo-Pacific has become critical to France’s trade interests.7 Not only is it home to six of the world’s biggest economies (members of the G20)—Australia, China, india, indonesia, Japan and South Korea—but its maritime trade routes linking Europe to the Pacific Ocean (via the indian Ocean and Southeast Asia). [...] 4, wiNter 2021 (October-December) 140 MahiMa Duggal Following this, the Marianne mission saw, for the first time in the western Pacific, the deployment of the nuclear attack submarine L’emeraude, to conduct a patrol of the highly contentious South China Sea waters.53 it aimed to not only affirm freedom of navigation and rule of international maritime law—the United Nations Convention on the Law of. [...] Paris has also led the La Pérouse exercises in the Bay of Bengal in April with the Quad member states since 2019, with india joining its 2021 edition.58 In the Pacific, it organises the Southern Cross in New Caledonia and also participates in fishery policing and rescue operations post-natural disasters, via its armed forces based in New Caledonia and Ploynesia, under the FrANZ agreement.59 Notabl.
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