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INDIA WILL NOT LET QUAD’S FOCUS ON INDO-PACIFIC TO BE DILUTED

PM Modi, EAM Jaishankar will meet their counterparts from Japan and US respectively, stressing on the Quad’s core agenda of countering China’s expansionist ambitions.

With US President Joe Biden’s closest aide and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan holding talks with China’s Yang Jiechi in Rome about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, India has started fine-tuning its strategy to ensure that the Quad’s Indo-Pacific focus does not get diluted or shifted to other global issues. While New Delhi closely follows this high-level meeting between the top officials of the US and China in Italy’s capital, India is ready to hold interactions with the leaders of the Quad countries in the days to come, during which the agenda will be to impress upon them that the focus of the forum should be on Indo-Pacific and, for that matter, obviously China’s expansionist ambitions in the region.

The US NSA’s meeting with the Chinese official is being seen by Indian diplomats as Biden’s bid to win Chinese cooperation on his sanctions against Russia. “In the emerging situation resulting in a new equation between the US and China, there is a risk of Quad’s core agenda being diluted,” diplomats said. “Beijing will get much-needed leverage in this situation and will then use it to extract concessions from Washington, which will not be good for Quad’s Indo-Pacific objectives,” sources said. These points are being discussed in the meetings at South Block, sources added.

Highly-placed sources told The Daily Guardian, “This issue has already been discussed at a high-level meeting of the Ministries of External Affairs and Defence officials with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.” “External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and NSA Ajit Doval were also present in the meeting,” sources added. PM Modi has already underlined the need for the Quad to stay focused on Indo-Pacific during a virtual meeting of the forum called by the US President Biden with the only agenda of the Ukraine conflict. PM Modi is going to highlight the same views about the Quad during his upcoming meeting with his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida on 19 March. As the next Quad summit meet is going to be held in Japan, Kishida’s interactions with PM Modi will be quite important. “The issue of Ukraine conflict will be there during talks between PM Modi and Kishida, but the Indian premier will definitely be impressing upon the visiting Japanese leader that the Quad’s main concern is Indo-Pacific, that Ukraine and other issues should not be allowed to divert its attention from there,” sources at MEA told The Daily Guardian.

Similarly, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar will be meeting his counterpart in US Antony Blinken during the much-awaited Indo-US 2 plus 2 meeting which is likely to take place in April. EAM Jaishankar and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh would be travelling to Washington to meet their counterparts under this format. But Jaishankar will have separate bilateral talks with Blinken during which Quad and Indo-Pacific will be the main issues. “Jaishankar will also try to get some inputs on the interactions between Biden’s NSA and China’s Jiechi,” sources said. Sources told this newspaper that the EAM has asked Indian ambassadors in Washington, Italy and Beijing, to have detailed updates on the meeting between the US and Chinese officials.

The input that Indian diplomats cannot lose sight of is that in the wake of the Ukraine crisis, Blinken has been in touch with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi. Blinken had spoken to Wang over phone for around an hour in what MEA sources said was part of Biden’s strategy to monitor China’s support for Russia.

In addition to this, the Biden administration is also looking to impress on China that any efforts to ease sanctions against Russia could have ramifications for its relations with the United States and Western allies.

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