New York: External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar met with Japan’s Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya in Washington to discuss deepening Quad engagement as they prepared for the ministerial meeting, later on Tuesday.
They will be joined by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Australia’s Foreign Minister Penny Wong at the Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting (QFMM).
Jaishankar posted on X that he and Iwaya exchanged views on deepening Quad engagement for a free and open Indo-Pacific.
“Our Special, Strategic and Global Partnership continues to deepen and diversify,” he said.
They also had comprehensive discussions on infrastructure, investment and mobility, he added.
Last week, EAM Jaishankar had a phone conversation with Wong ahead of the Quad meeting.
This will be the first time that the ministers get together after the Pahalgam attack by Pakistan-backed terrorists and India’s decisive ‘Operation Sindoor’ against them.
The ministerial is expected to lay the groundwork for the Quad Leaders’ Summit to be hosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi that will bring US President Donald Trump, and Prime Ministers Anthony Albanese of Australia and Ishiba Shigeru of Japan to India, later this year.
EAM Jaishankar said that there has been a lot of progress with the Quad since it was restarted in Trump’s first term.
Speaking at a Newsweek fireside chat in New York on Monday, he said at their ministerial they have “to do a stock taking and look at how we should take this further”.
“But there are a lot of issues that we need to discuss in the Indo-Pacific, you know, issues about maritime safety, security, issues about connectivity, issues of technology, issues of pandemic preparedness, issues, even, of you know, education”, he said of their agenda.
Countries from “four corners of the Indo-Pacific, who have decided that they have a shared interest in creating a stabler, more prosperous Indo-Pacific, and are willing to work in a very practical basis,” he said.
While Trump has complained about other international groups – like NATO and others – that the US was carrying an unfair burden, it did not apply to the Quad, according to EAM Jaishankar.
“It’s a kind of an equal arrangement. You know, everybody pays their fair share as you go along”.
“That’s very much today, an acceptable way of working”, he added.
(IANS)
