New Delhi: In what is viewed as big push to QUAD, a virtual meeting of the leaders of the four nations of the regional bloc, are likely to hold their first-ever meeting under this banner.
They are US President Joe Biden, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the meeting is to be organised at Washington’s behest will take place later this month or early in April, according to highly placed sources.
Morrison hinted at a press conference on March 5 that such a meeting may be on the cards. “…I am looking forward to that first gathering of the Quad leaders. It will be the first ever such gathering,” he said.
The US, Australia and Japan, sources said, want to hold the meeting this month itself even as India is yet to “formally confirm.”
“No formal decision has been taken yet,” a senior official said.
The planned meeting of the Quad leaders comes days after the member nations’ foreign ministers met virtually for their third informal session on February 18. The meeting took place in the backdrop of India and China’s efforts to pursue disengagement at all friction points in Ladakh.
When the Quad Summit happens, it will also be the first event where Modi and Biden will come together since the latter assumed charge as President this January.
Speaking about the Quad, Morrison said it “will be four leaders, four countries, working together constructively for the peace, prosperity and stability of the Indo-Pacific, which is good for everyone in the Indo-Pacific.”
“The President and indeed, the Secretary of State, have made clear that their re-engagement in multilateral organisations, particularly in the Indo-Pacific, is key to building stability and peace in the Indo-Pacific. We share that view. We encourage that view. And we strongly welcome that view,” he added.
“And so I am looking forward to that first gathering of the Quad leaders. It will be the first ever such gathering,” Morrison said.
Morrison stated that he had discussed this issue with Biden, Suga and Modi in recent conversations. “And of course we’re looking forward to those discussions and follow-up face-to-face meetings as well. This will become a feature of Indo-Pacific engagement,” he said.
Modi and Morrison spoke to each other on February 18, hours before the Quad foreign affairs ministers’ meeting.
At the meeting, according to a statement issued by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), the ministers “recognised that the changes underway in the world make a strong case for their countries working closely together … It was important for the international community that the direction of changes remains positive and beneficial to all.”
The same month, the Pentagon said India is a “critical partner, especially when you consider all of the challenges in the Indo-Pacific region.”
US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said in January the Quad grouping is a “foundation upon which to build substantial American policy in the Indo-Pacific region.”
China has been critical of Quad, and has referred to it as a “mini NATO.” Russia believes the Indo-Pacific policy within which the Quad operates is “anti-China.”
The Quad countries also held a joint maritime drill under the Malabar Exercise in November 2020.
