Maldives Strategy in the Indo-Pacific
Dr Athaulla A Rasheed is a former diplomat for the Maldives Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is now an academic in the Department of Pacific Affairs at The Australian National University
President Dr Mohamed Muizzu’s October 2024 visit to India has heightened the developing relationship between Maldives and India. This favours the Indo-Pacific strategy that seeks to harmonise, extend and cultivate free and open relationships between Maldives and regional partners, including India, the United States, Australia and Japan.
The relations between Malé and New Delhi have always been stable. However, recent decades have seen significant shifts in Maldives’ policy priorities between India and China. Between 2013-2018, Malé favoured China’s economic support but, following a change of government, policy shifted between 2018-2023 to favour India. In November 2023, as Muizzu took office, the foreign policy stance changed again from a growing ‘India out’ sentiment, related to the presence of Indian troops in the country, to a ‘Maldives first’ policy.
The ’Maldives first’ policy has engendered a balanced foreign policy allowing Muizzu’s administration to navigate relations with all interested partners. Despite the balanced approach, policy shifts away from India or toward China have always created some level of anxiety for Maldives’ Indo-Pacific partners, especially those members of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD).
Rather than viewing Maldives’ foreign partnerships through the Indo-Pacific (security) strategy – a policy that mainly concerns the rise of China – Maldives has been pushing for a bilateral approach to promote mutual interests without undermining broader regional security objectives.
Framing Strategic Partnership Priorities
The basis of Maldives’ strategic partnerships primarily lies in its relations with India. Since the establishment of diplomatic ties, following independence in 1965, both countries have enjoyed a close relationship working towards national and regional development and security objectives. Bilaterally, their cooperation has ranged from high-level political exchanges, a defence dialogue and trade arrangements to climate adaption, disaster relief, financial aid and infrastructure development. Regionally, Maldives has partnered with India’s security efforts particularly in the maritime security domain.
With growing demand for economic development and climate resilience strategies, Maldives has extended its search for developmental aid cooperation beyond India. A strategically significant shift occurred in 2013 when Maldives received major development aid from China’s Belt and Road Initiative. This new relationship was on display again in 2018 when China aided former President Abdulla Yameen’s administration in building national infrastructure such as a US$200 million ocean bridge connecting Malé and the international airport island.
Alongside the growing foreign debt owed to China, increasingly friendly Maldives-China relations have highlighted an area of strategic concern for India as a regional security actor.
India, however, has refrained from interfering with domestic politics and in November 2018, the defeat of Yameen’s government by former President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih indicated a course correction in the eyes of New Delhi. Solih pursued an ‘India First’ approach which saw India launch new mega infrastructure projects involving a US$500 million multiple-bridge project, connecting three islands with Malé. This pendulum approach to foreign policy dictated by changing governments has made Maldives the stage for increasing regional power competition between China and India.
This type of power competition does give Maldives some leverage, however foreign investments purposely driven by changing foreign policy alignments do not make for a sustainable development or security cooperation strategy. This also creates a division in the domestic politics of Maldives with certain parties seeing a relationship with India as in the national interest while others see China filling that role.
This was evident in the recent 2023 India out election campaign which saw former president Solih pin his hopes on continued cooperation and partnership with India while current president Muizzu ran on a India out media rhetoric. Despite this, Muizzu’s post-election statement that ‘I’m pro-Maldives, I believe that we are too small a nation to be entangled in this so-called geopolitical fight between bigger nations’ indicated a further shift opening up the opportunity to engage with third parties in the interests of Maldives. Muizzu’s subsequent visit to Türkiye initiated collaboration on advanced technology and tactical drone platform development, helping to build up its own defence and surveillance capabilities. This serves as an example of Maldives navigating jostling regional powers to extend its foreign strategic engagements.
Equally, Muizzu has shown a more measured and multifaceted approach with Maldives-Turkey engagement and the more recent Maldives-China agreements signed during Muizzu’s January 2024 visit to China. These are not challenging but occurring parallel with ongoing Maldives-India relations as Muizzu’s October 2024 visit to India illustrates.
Indo-Pacific Partnerships and Security Interests
The US, Australia and Japan, as part of their Indo-Pacific strategy to enhance free and open relations with the Indian Ocean’s small states, have pursued ongoing development and security cooperation with Maldives. Despite suspicion over Muizzu’s initial tilt away from India, continued engagements in development, climate change and security have facilitated Indo-Pacific partners ability to pursue their strategic interests with Maldives.
Since the establishment of diplomatic ties with the US in 1966, Maldives and the US have enjoyed high-level exchanges, a defence dialogue, and cooperation on development, health, climate adaptation and security. Current aid levels amount to $36 million with around $10.8 million going towards maritime security capabilities. In 2020, Maldives signed its first defence cooperation agreement with the US – this was supported by India – to deepen and expand military cooperation. The military-to-military exchanges have also engaged the US military with the local context encouraging them to better understand and engage with issues such as climate change and rising sea levels which are both high on Maldives national security agenda. This has generated a two-way approach to defence exchanges. US-led regional exercises, such as ‘Atlas Angel’ in August of this year, have expanded Maldives’ contribution and role in shaping US military efforts to promote disaster preparedness and response in the Indian Ocean.
Australia has also been a long-term strategic partner in development cooperation supporting Maldives in human resource development – over 700 Maldivians have been trained in Australia – and providing governance and technical aid including in the context of COVID-19 recovery and climate adaptation support. Australia opened its first High Commission in Malé in 2023 allowing them to establish direct connections with local grassroot actors and communities, including the Maldives-Australia alumni groups. The High Commission’s community-based engagements have helped to deepen the relationship and provide a better understanding of the local interests shaping national and foreign policy. Military-to-military cooperation with Australia has also been rooted in local interests, through search and rescue operations, maritime security strategy dialogues, and maritime surveillance engagements. They have also engaged in a climate change and security dialogue encouraging the incorporation of climate change into military policy. This feeds into efforts at the regional level helping Australia to incorporate its climate knowledge into its regional efforts such as the co-hosting of COP31 with the Pacific Islands.
Japan is the other key Indo-Pacific partner for Maldives. The two have cooperated on human resource development, environmental protection, sustainable fisheries, communication and humanitarian efforts/ reconstruction assistance in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami. Following a extraordinarily high wave in 1987 which destroyed the low-lying island infrastructure of Maldives, Japan supported the construction of seawalls that have served to defend the islands and shape Maldives approach to rising sea levels – the impact of the 2004 tsunami on Malé was minimised because of those seawalls. Through Japan’s free and open Indo-Pacific strategy, Maldives efforts against maritime threats and climate change have been an area of interest for Japan.
Maldives has value to add to relations with Indo-Pacific partners. Its engagements with India, the US, Australia and Japan have advanced knowledge and demonstrated how small states can pursue their own interests in a complex regional geopolitical and strategic environment. By cooperating with all willing partners, Maldives is able to chart a course to pursue its own development and security interests and contribute to the broader Indo-Pacific strategy.
The opinions expressed are those of the contributor, not of the RSAA.