http://news.xinhuanet.com, BANGKOK: More than 300 naval officers from Thailand and Malaysia on Friday kicked off a joint training exercise on the sea off southern Thailand, local press reported on Saturday.
The joint exercises would allow the two sides to exchange ideas and experience and consolidate the relationship of the navies, said Rear Admiral Weera Ongsri, Deputy Commander of Thailand's 2nd Region Navy Division.
This year's SEAEX-THAMAL exercises, started on the sea off the Songkla province lying some 1,000 kilometers south of Bangkok, represented the 38th year of Thai-Malaysian naval cooperation, according to the state-run Thai News Agency (TNA).
Operations of the exercises would be carried out off the coast of Thailand's southernmost province of Narathiwat and Malaysia's northern Kelantan State.
The 7-day event would bring together four naval fighting vessels from Thailand and three from Malaysia.
Naval officers from the two countries regularly undertake joint patrols in the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea.
