Agence France Presse

New Delhi, February 19:

India and Britain will hold a joint military planning exercise next month which will be the largest such operation in more than five decades, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said yesterday.

Called “Emerald Mercury”, the mock exercises in Hyderabad city would be accompanied by a “strong programme of military training, exchanges, attachments, visits and joint working groups,” Straw told a seminar here. The visiting foreign secretary said Britain and India were also fighting terrorism through training and intensive policy discussions.

He said a full-time police liaison officer would be deputed at the British high commission in New Delhi for the purspose.