The 13th meeting of the India-Australia Joint Working Group on Counter-Terrorism was held in person on 4 May, 2022. Mr Mahaveer Singhvi, Joint Secretary for Counter-Terrorism at the Ministry of External Affairs of India and Mr Roger Noble, Ambassador for Counter-Terrorism in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Australia led the respective delegations of experts to discuss the ongoing counter-terrorism cooperation between the two countries.

Both sides underlined their commitment to coordinate and collaborate on this important element of the India-Australia Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.

India and Australia strongly condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations and emphasised the need for strengthening international cooperation to combat terrorism in a comprehensive and sustained manner. Both sides condemned the use of terrorist proxies for cross-border terrorism.

India and Australia underlined the urgent need for all countries to take immediate, sustained, verifiable and irreversible action to ensure that no territory under their control is used for terrorist attacks and to expeditiously bring to justice the perpetrators of such attacks. Australia reiterated its condemnation of terrorist attacks in India, including 26/11 Mumbai, Pathankot and Pulwama attacks, and reiterated its support for the people and the government of India in the global fight against terrorism.

India and Australia exchanged views on various areas of cooperation in the sphere of counter-terrorism, including countering radicalisation and violent extremism; combating the financing of terrorism; the proscription of terrorist individuals and entities as a tool to combat terrorism; preventing the exploitation of the internet for terrorism; law enforcement cooperation; information sharing and capacity building.

Both sides reaffirmed their commitment to work closely together to respond to these challenges and discussed ways to deepen engagement between their respective counterpart agencies to further advance interaction, cooperation and information sharing in the sphere of counter-terrorism.

The two sides also discussed counter-terrorism cooperation in multilateral fora such as the UN, G20, GCTF, ARF, IORA and FATF, as well as with Quad partners, and ways to further enhance this cooperation. Australia looked forward to hosting India at the next Quad Counter-Terrorism Tabletop Exercise in October 2022, while India welcomed Australia’s participation in the proposed No Money for Terror Conference in New Delhi, scheduled for later in 2022.