China and Pakistan may set up a Joint Military Commission as the two nations are set to further expand bilateral defence cooperation, amid tension along the disputed boundaries the two nations share with India.
China’s state-owned Hudong Zhonghua Shipyard Company Limited of late launched a Type-054A/P frigate it built for the Pakistan Navy. The company based in Shanghai in China is likely to roll out three more advanced warships for the navy of the all-weather ally of the communist country over the next few months.
Beijing is likely to pledge supply of more military hardware for the Pakistan Army, Navy and Air Force during the proposed visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Islamabad, which may be his second to a foreign country during the Covid-19 pandemic after the one to Myanmar in January. The two nations are also discussing a proposal to set up a Joint Military Commission to further boost cooperation between the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and the Pakistan Army.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi recently hosted his Pakistani counterpart M Shah Mahmood Qureshi for the second bilateral strategic dialogue at Hainan in south China. The meet between the two Foreign Ministers was apparently aimed at setting the stage for the Chinese President’s visit to Pakistan.
The two sides are learnt to have discussed the proposal of setting up the Joint Military Commission as one of the possible outcomes of Xi’s meetings with Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan and Pakistan Army chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa during his visit to Islamabad.
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Neither China, nor Pakistan, however, so far officially announced Chinese President’s visit to Islamabad.
New Delhi is closely monitoring the move by China and Pakistan to step up defence cooperation. “The possibility of a two-front military conflict has been factored in (by the military planners of India),” said a source in New Delhi.
If it comes into existence, the China-Pakistan Joint Military Commission is likely to act as a mechanism for operational coordination between the Pakistan Army and the Chinese PLA. The move by China and Pakistan comes just a few weeks after India and Australia signed a military logistics sharing agreement.
India already has a military logistics sharing arrangement with the United States and it is likely to ink a similar agreement with Japan soon.