The SA Navy will join warships from China, Russia and Iran in practising maritime safety and protection operations. Warships from China, Russia and Iran have begun arriving in False Bay for the joint naval exercise Will for Peace, which South Africa is hosting from 9-16 January. A Chinese destroyer and replenishment ship and an Iranian corvette, a forward base ship and an expeditionary base ship had already arrived by Thursday.
A Russian corvette and supply ship were expected to arrive on Friday. China is leading what has been billed as a “BRICS-Plus” exercise, though that is not official and not all 10 of the BRICS-Plus countries seem to be participating. The Democratic Alliance has protested that conducting military exercises with these three countries undermines South Africa’s supposed non-aligned global posture and that BRICS is not supposed to have a defence function.
One of the pictures we used in this photo essay was miscredited. We apologise for the error and have taken it down.
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