WITH CHINA ON MIND, QUAD FOREIGN MINISTERS SET TO MEET

With China’s aggressive behaviour as one of the key agendas, the Foreign Ministers of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad) countries are set to meet this month in Australia. External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar will attend the meet with a comprehensive plan to share with his counterparts from the United States, Australia and Japan and give crucial inputs on growing Chinese activities in the Indo-Pacific, sources told The Daily Guardian.

Diplomatic sources told The Daily Guardian that during the discussions, EAM Jaishankar is set to lay emphasis on the need for the Quad to intensify engagement with ASEAN countries. “Quad member countries have recognised the centrality of ASEAN nations in tackling the Indo-Pacific in view of Chinese aggressive activities in the region,” say sources. According to sources, EAM Jaishankar intends to have a bilateral meeting with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during his Australia visit. “EAM wants to use the opportunity to discuss with his US counterpart some other important issues like Afghanistan, terrorism emanating from Pakistan soil and China’s aggression along the Line of Control,” sources say. He may also meet all the other foreign ministers separately, but his main focus is to spend more time with Antony Blinken in a bilateral discussion, officials told The Daily Guardian.

“Quad has ramped up engagement with Indonesia only recently on the advice of India. The engagement with Indonesia is part of a strategy to deal with problems in the Indo-Pacific with China on mind,” sources said. Undoubtedly, all the ingress routes to South China Sea are under Indonesian jurisdiction, which makes Jakarta quite important for the Quad.

Apart from EAM S. Jaishankar and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the Foreign Ministers of Japan, Yoshimasa Hayashi, and Marise Payne of Australia are expected to attend the meet in Melbourne on a two-day summit. The date of the summit has not yet been finalised.

Sources say that the ministers will discuss further ways to enhance cooperation efforts designed to counter China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific region. When all the Quad Foreign Ministers interact with each other in Melbourne, they will delve deeper into areas of shared concerns, with countering China’s influence in the region being one of them, says an official.

The Quad, officially the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, represents India, Australia, the US and Japan. Observers say that the meeting will be crucial also in view of growing border tensions between Russia and Ukraine and the closeness between Russia and China.