Coco Island Intelligence Facility

Chinese involvement on Myanmar's Great Coco Island has been debated since the early 1990s, when reports first surfaced of a Chinese-built radar and signals-intelligence station on the island, roughly 55 kilometres north of India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands. According to GlobalSecurity.org, construction of a comprehensive SIGINT collection facility began in late 1992, with the radar and signals-intelligence infrastructure reportedly operational by 1994.

The claims have long been contested, however. India's own chief of army staff publicly stated in 2005 that no Chinese intelligence base existed on the island, after Indian officials were permitted to inspect the site directly. A 2023 Chatham House analysis based on satellite imagery similarly found little evidence of a functioning intelligence facility beyond a heavily weathered radar station, though it noted signs of renewed construction activity that raised concern in India.

More recent assessments point to expansion. A 2024 analysis from India's Observer Research Foundationcited Maxar satellite imagery showing an extended runway and a strengthened signals-intelligence architecture on the islands, and noted that Myanmar's military has denied assisting China at the site. The facility's current status therefore remains disputed among analysts — independent, on-the-ground verification is limited, and open-source assessments range from describing it as a monitoring station under expansion to questioning whether any active Chinese-operated facility exists at all.