By AFP and Focus | 2026-07-15

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi secured a landmark uranium supply agreement with Australia and upgraded India's relationship with New Zealand to a strategic partnership, expanding economic and defense cooperation with two Pacific democracies during a multinational regional tour.

Modi signed the uranium agreement with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in Melbourne on July 9 before traveling to Auckland, where he and New Zealand Prime Minister Christopher Luxon unveiled the "India-New Zealand Strategic Partnership: Roadmap to 2030" on July 11.

"We have signed an important agreement today on nuclear energy," Modi said after the Melbourne talks, adding it would "pave the way for uranium supplies from Australia to India and give our clean energy objectives fresh momentum." Albanese said the deal would "help increase the share of non-fossil fuel power capacity" in India.

The Australian leader described the agreement as opening a new market for Australian miners.

A joint statement said the exports, covered by International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards, are for "exclusively peaceful purposes." The safeguards are significant because India is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Australia holds about 28% of the world's uranium reserves.

India aims to boost nuclear generating capacity to 100GW by 2047 from about 8GW today as electricity demand continues to rise, according to Nikkei Asia.

Defense, security push

Beyond energy, Modi and Albanese agreed to bolster defense cooperation, strengthen critical-mineral supply chains and build a temporary space tracking terminal on Australia's Cocos (Keeling) Islands to support Indian space missions. The two countries have expanded economic ties since their 2022 Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement.

In Auckland, the two leaders launched the new strategic partnership covering closer defense cooperation, including naval exercises, alongside trade, diplomacy and science. The road map reaffirmed support for a "free, open, peaceful and prosperous" regional order.

"We are a small trading nation. We are a maritime nation," Luxon told reporters, adding New Zealand needs "as many relationships as we possibly can with partners around the world that are like-minded" on defense and trade.

The agreements reflect India's broader effort to forge strategic ties with like-minded partners as regional security concerns intensify.

The New Zealand visit came days after China test-fired a submarine-launched ballistic missile into the South Pacific on July 6, with the dummy warhead landing inside the Treaty of Rarotonga's nuclear-free zone.

"China carried out the test within hours of informing us," New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters said afterward.

Wary of Beijing

The India-Australia relationship is becoming more consequential as both countries face a more assertive China while maintaining extensive trade ties with it, Pradeep Taneja, a senior lecturer in Asian studies at the University of Melbourne, said.

"China's the elephant in the room," he told Nikkei Asia, adding both countries have an interest in reducing that reliance. India records roughly $150 billion in annual trade with China, while about one-third of Australia's exports go to China.

Modi's visit, the first by an Indian prime minister to New Zealand in 40 years, marked a milestone but will require sustained follow-through to avoid becoming a one-off diplomatic gesture, Rahul Mishra, a senior research fellow at Thammasat University's German-Southeast Asian Center of Excellence in Bangkok, wrote in the Diplomat.

India and other regional middle powers have increasingly sought stronger country-to-country security ties amid a more contested strategic environment.