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New Delhi: Sticking to his anti-India stand, Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu told the parliament today that the island nation will not allow \u201cany country to interfere with or undermine our sovereignty\u201d. He said New Delhi and Male have agreed that Indian troops will leave The Maldives by May 10, according to local media reports.<\/p>\n
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President Muizzu said Indian troops on one of the three aviation platforms in the island nation will leave by March 10, and those on the other two will pull out by May 10. \u201cMaldives will not renew the agreement with India to chart the country\u2019s inner and underwater charts. We will not allow any country to interfere with or undermine our sovereignty,\u201d the President said.<\/p>\n
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The two main opposition parties \u2013 MDP and Democrats \u2013 boycotted President Muizzu\u2019s speech.<\/p>\n
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Both the parties have 56 MPs (43+13) in the 87-seat Parliament. Seven MPs have resigned to get administrator posts in the Muizzu government. Out of present strength of 80, only 24 MPs were present during the President\u2019s speech. Local reports suggest it\u2019s the biggest boycott in Maldivian parliament history. MDP and Democrats are also working on a proposal to impeach President Muizzu.<\/p>\n
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India has 87 troops in the island nation to provide humanitarian aid and medical evacuation. President Muizzu\u2019s campaign had focused on reducing Indian influence in the affairs of The Maldives and the presence of Indian soldiers emerged as a major point of contention ever since he took over.<\/p>\n
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Reuters had earlier reported that the two sides had reached an agreement on the withdrawal of troops at a meeting in New Delhi.<\/p>\n
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The External Affairs Ministry has said the two countries \u201cagreed on a set of mutually workable solutions to enable continued operation of Indian aviation platforms\u201d that provide humanitarian services to the Maldives. The soldiers, Reuters reported, will be replaced by civilians.<\/p>\n
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President Muizzu\u2019s anti-India stance has drawn criticism at home, especially in the light of the new government\u2019s outreach to China. Soon after taking over, President Muizzu visited China and met its President Xi Jinping. This was a major shift from The Maldives\u2019 traditionally close ties with India, and also a significant development in view of the geopolitical equations in the Indian Ocean region.<\/p>\n
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Opposition parties MDP and The Democrats recently issued a joint statement, describing the shift in the island nation\u2019s foreign policy as \u201cextremely detrimental\u201d.<\/p>\n
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The statement said that \u201calienating any development partner, and especially the country\u2019s most long-standing ally, will be extremely detrimental to the long-term development of the country\u201d. It also stressed that \u201cstability and security in the Indian Ocean is vital to the stability and security of the Maldives\u201d.<\/p>\n
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Another party has urged President Muizzu to apologise to India. Gasuim Ibrahim, leader of the Jumhoori Party, has said the Maldives President must formally apologise to India and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and seek \u201cdiplomatic reconciliation\u201d to mend ties.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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[ad_1] New Delhi: Sticking to his anti-India stand, Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu told the parliament today that the island nation will not allow \u201cany country to interfere with or undermine our sovereignty\u201d. He said New Delhi and Male have agreed that Indian troops will leave The Maldives by May 10, according to local media reports. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-world"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20260"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20262,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20260\/revisions\/20262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thenftimes.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}