KARACHI, March 7 A Chinese counterterrorism expert has said that Pakistan should be regarded as a decisive partner in Beijing's Indian Ocean security strategy and the Gwadar port project should lay a cornerstone for it.

However, he maintained that from the Chinese point of view, the Gwadar port was a means of acquiring energy diversity and not a fort to scout and dominate the Indian Ocean.

The Chinese perspective of the maritime security in the Gulf, the Arabian Sea, the Malacca Strait and Gwadar was presented by Dr Ye Hailin, the counter-terrorism specialist of the Beijing-based China Academy of Sciences, at the concluding session of the maritime conference here on Saturday.

The conference was part of the multinational naval exercise - Aman 2009 - organised by the Pakistan Navy.

The issues of the ongoing piracy threat in the Gulf of Aden, energy flows, container traffic, transoceanic commerce, increasing focus on littoral threats, and the focus on the development of “brown-water” naval operations in the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean regions were deliberated upon during the two-day conference. Referring to what he described as the Chinese economic miracle, Dr Ye said that China had been transforming from a traditional land power to a new type of sea power, which needed a sophisticated and modernised navy and more frequent international engagement on maritime security.

He claimed that China's sea strategy pursued to control its marginal sea and Sea Lines of Communications.

Rear Admiral Phillip Jones from the United Kingdom discussed the maritime security operation off the coast of Somalia. Following a surge in piracy in one of the world's busiest shipping lanes off Somalia, the European Union had agreed to launch a British-led anti-piracy naval operation off the coast of Somalia involving warships and aircraft from several nations.

Dr James Boutilier, the special adviser in Canada's Maritime Forces Pacific Headquarters, deliberated on emerging challenges and threats to the Arabian Sea and Gulf Littorals in the context of evolving maritime security.

Dr Boutilier said that both China and India, reliant on export-driven economies, had reoriented their national axes toward the sea.

Both nations are building up their naval power and the United States Navy, concerned about the dramatic growth of the Chinese navy, has repositioned the bulk of its carrier and submarine assets into the Pacific. These tectonic shifts in naval power and the problem of reconciling national foreign policy objectives with operational priorities constituted a series of significant challenges, he said.

Dr Han Ling Wang of the Centre for International Law of the Sea of the Chinese Academy of Sciences discussed legal issues in anti-piracy operations in the Gulf of Aden and discussed among other things the procedure for handling of pirates caught at sea.

Rear Admiral Agha Danish of the Pakistan Navy discussed the regional maritime cluster, challenges and the opportunities for trade and economy.

He examined the regional potential and opportunities provided to the Gulf and littoral and particularly to Pakistan, as well as traditional and non-traditional challenges regarding maritime security.

Emerging non-proliferation initiatives and maritime security was the subject of Bradford-based director of the South Asian Strategic Stability Institute, Maria Sultan.

Dr Wang De Hua of the Shanghai Association of International Relations said that today the geo-politics of the Indian Ocean and particularly of the Arabian Sea was largely influenced by the China-Pakistan and Indian relations.

Issues pertaining to economic resources in the sea, coastal zone management, fisheries and other resources, geological evolutions and materials from the Arabian Sea, ship generated pollution, role of religion in combat and war honour, maritime potentials of Pakistan and the potential threat of tropical cyclones to Pakistan's coast were also discussed.