QUAD to work towards open and inclusive Indo-Pacific

On Friday (Feb 11, 2022) foreign ministers of QUAD member countries agreed collectively to work towards a free, inclusive and open Indo-Pacific, and to fight against threats like terrorism together.

Who was present in the meeting?

As has been reported by Financial Express Online earlier, external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar, Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Australia’s Ms Marise Payn had held talks in Melbourne.

Subtle message to China

At the end of the meeting, addressing a joint press briefing, the Australian Foreign Minister said that all the ministers of the QUAD reaffirmed their support to protection of national sovereignty and observance of rules and fair play, and supported the principles of openness.

Dr Jaishankar told the Australian media persons “The QUAD countries are building a vibrant and substantial framework. We are building an agenda which seeks to further our shared vision of a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific.”

Adding, “All the countries are keen to work together towards stability, peace and economic prosperity within the Indo-Pacific, we all are keen to work together.”

According to him, the ongoing efforts towards combating COVID-19 were reviewed and the members agreed to expedite delivery of safe and affordable vaccines. They also agreed to support in augmenting infrastructure for last-mile delivery and help in augmenting the infrastructure.

Before the foreign ministers of the QUAD sat down for the 4^th edition of ministerial level talks, all the four ministers including Mr Jaishankar, Mr Blinken, Mr Hayashi and Ms Payne jointly called on Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison. The importance of the QUAD in context of the ongoing geopolitical developments was discussed when the ministers met with the Australian Prime Minister.

According to reports, the Australian leader talked about the support Australia received by its QUAD partners in terms of security in the region. He also talked about the economic and humanitarian partnership and cooperation among the member countries and most importantly in the context of a free and open Indo-Pacific.

Thanking the foreign ministers, the Australian PM also said that the member countries are working together on many projects and the partnership is not only limited to traditional regional security issues.

The focus of QUAD

Cooperation connectivity projects, promoting startups, facilitating the mobility of students, producing vaccines for COVID-19 as well as technology collaboration.

To maintain a diverse, open and interoperable telecommunication ecosystem through collaboration with like-minded partners, the members are working on 5G technology and vendor diversification.

In March last year, the working group on critical and emerging technologies was launched and 4 subgroups were established. Each subgroup is being led by the member country.

Vaccines

In 2022, it was announced that one billion doses will be delivered to the Indo-Pacific region by the end of 2022. There has been good progress under this initiative. And as has been reported earlier, the production of Johnson and Johnson’s Janssen vaccines started at the Biological E facility located in Hyderabad in October 2021. This was set up through a credit line of USD 50 million – by the US Development Financial Cooperation (DFC). This was meant to help in augmenting manufacturing capacity.

Under the QUAD vaccine partnership, India is open to supplying safe and affordable vaccines, such as COVOVAX and CORBEVAX. These will be made in India.