India-Britain naval games in the Atlantic Ocean from June 20

A task group of the Navy will hold the Konkan naval war games with the Royal Navy off Portsmouth in southern Britain next week.The Navy task group, led by the Guided Missile Destroyer INS Delhi and comprising stealth Frigates INS Beas and INS Brahmaputra, and the tanker INS Aditya, will reach Portsmouth on June 17, Navy officers said here on Friday.Konkan, an annual exercise, will take place from June 20 to 25 and will focus on anti-submarine warfare manoeuvres, apart from anti-air and anti-surface skills including specialist boarding operations, officers said.Since 2004, four such Konkan Indo-British exercises have been held and this will be the first in the series to be conducted in UK waters.The Royal Navy contingent, commanded by Commodore Simon Ancona, would include frigates HMS Westminster and HMS Lancaster, the nuclear powered submarine HMS Trafalgar, the auxiliaries RFA Mounts Bay and RFA Fort Rosalie and an RAF Nimrod maritime patrol aircraft.A team of Indian Navy divers will also be conducting Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) training with the Plymouth-based Southern Diving Group.The task group, under the command of Western Fleet Flag Officer Commanding Rear Admiral Surinder Pal Singh, is currently on a four-month long deployment in the Arabian Sea, Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean since April and will return to India only in the first week of August.

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