Maldives snubs India over hydrographic survey deal after signing military pact with China

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24/7 monitoring system for the Maldivian waters this month to ensure control of its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) despite its significantly large area. Speaking at a ceremony at one of the islands that he was visiting on Monday, Muizzu said, the Maldives Ministry of Defence is making efforts to obtain the facilities required for conducting the hydrographic surveys by the country itself. “This will allow Maldives to conduct the underwater surveys of the country by ourselves.

We will then acquire all insights of our underwater features and prepare charts, they will be drawn by us," the president was quoted as saying by Edition.mv, a news portal on Tuesday. Efforts to conduct the hydrography survey in collaboration with India’s Hydrography Office was launched in January 2021. Maldives' former administration, led by then President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, had signed an agreement with the Indian government to conduct hydrographic surveys of Maldives’ underwater features.

"We decided not to renew the agreement entered into with the Indian government to scan and acquire all insights and sceneries of our underwater body. All these underwater details are the property of our heritage. They depart after performing scans in manners that acquaint them to all insights [of Maldives’ underwater body], draw maps [from the surveys] and to top it all, we end up having to purchase it from them as well," the President was quoted as saying.

Earlier, Muizzu said his government has vowed to begin work on and establish a 24/7 monitoring system of the Maldivian waters in March. “Although the EEZ is part of our territory, we did not have the capacity to monitor the area. God willing, our work (to monitor the Maldivian waters) will commence in March.