By Vinay Kumar
NEW DELHI. Within hours of President Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th President, the US hosted a meeting of Quad foreign ministers where the four-nation grouping vowed cooperation and with an eye on China, the US, Australia, India and Japan recommitted to working together to free and open Indo-Pacific.
With anti-China focus, the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Japan’s Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya “strongly opposed any unilateral actions that seek to change the status quo by force or coercion.’’
The meeting of Quad foreign ministers signalled countering China a top priority for the Trump administration.
In a joint statement after the talks in Washington, hosted by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on his first day in office, the Quad nations said officials would meet regularly to prepare for an upcoming leaders’ summit in India, expected this year. Actually, India was to host the summit last year but US President Joe Biden was keen to hold it in Wilmington.
Rubio’s First Meeting
Significantly, the first meeting the new Secretary of State had after assuming office with a foreign representative was with India’s Minister for External Affairs S Jaishankar.
Rule of Law and Free and Open Pacific
The Quad foreign ministers reaffirmed their “shared commitment to strengthening a Free and Open Indo-Pacific.
They said, in a Joint Statement: “We, the Secretary of State of the United States and the Foreign Ministers of Australia, India, and Japan, met today in Washington D.C. to reaffirm our shared commitment to strengthening a Free and Open Indo-Pacific where the rule of law, democratic values, sovereignty, and territorial integrity are upheld and defended.”
“Our four nations maintain our conviction that international law, economic opportunity, peace, stability, and security in all domains including the maritime domain underpin the development and prosperity of the peoples of the Indo-Pacific. We also strongly oppose any unilateral actions that seek to change the status quo by force or coercion.”
It further reiterated their commitment towards “strengthening regional maritime, economic, and technology security in the face of increasing threats, as well as promoting reliable and resilient supply chains.’’
On X, minister Jaishankar described the meeting as “productive”.
He wrote: “Significant that the Quad FMM took place within hours of the inauguration of the Trump administration. This underlines the priority it has in the foreign policy of its member states. Our wide-ranging discussions addressed different dimensions of ensuring a free, open, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific.’’
Significance of the Timing
Jaishankar told reporters at the Indian Embassy in Washington DC, that the timing of the meeting itself was a “message”. He said that for Secretary Rubio and minister Iwaya, it was the first Quad meeting that they were attending. “There was an animated exchange of ideas. The sentiment was that Quad is a collaborative activity. It is important to keep adding substance and do more and more.’’
Clearly, the message from the joint statement indicated shared concerns about China’s belligerence with neighbours, actions in the waters, weaponisation of supply chains, violation of international tribunal decisions and the law of seas. China also claims most of South China Sea’s areas which, however, has seen counter-claims by Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan.
Jaishankar said that Quad nations had agreed on the importance of thinking bigger, deepening the agenda and intensifying cooperation. The meeting is a message that “in an uncertain world, the Quad will continue to be a force for global good.’’
Wong, the Australian Foreign Minister, said on microblogging site X, “the meeting demonstrates our shared determination to work together for a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific region.”
Quad is a strategic security dialogue between Australia, India, Japan, and the US that is maintained by talks between member countries.
The dialogue was initiated in 2007 by then Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, with the support of then Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, then Australian Prime Minister John Howard, and then US Vice President Dick Cheney.
The dialogue was paralleled by joint military exercises of an unprecedented scale, titled Exercise Malabar. The diplomatic and military arrangement was widely viewed as a response to increased Chinese economic and military power in the Indo-Pacific, a region stretching from the east coast of Japan to the east coast of Africa.
