S Jaishankar to hold bilateral talks with Antony Blinken during Quad meet

New Delhi, February 5

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Melbourne when the two are there on February 10 onwards to attend the Quad summit with their counterparts from Australia and Japan.

This will be their first in-person meeting since they last met in October in Rome on the sidelines of the G20 meeting. The meeting will set the stage for an in-person Quad summit for which PM Narendra Modi may visit Tokyo, possibly in May.

Will reaffirm our strategic partnership

The meeting will reaffirm our vitally important strategic partnership. I’m confident that part of that discussion will relate to the challenges that China poses to those values (of Quad) and to that rules-based order in number of sectors. Daniel Kritenbrink, us official

The Blinken-Jaishankar meeting will “reaffirm our vitally important strategic partnership”, said US State Department’s Assistant Secretary for East Asia and the Pacific Daniel Kritenbrink.

“I’m confident that part of that discussion (at the Quad) will relate to the challenges that China poses to those values (of the Quad) and to that rules-based order in a number of sectors,” he added.

The meeting will take place shortly after the Putin-Xi joint statement that opposed any independence for Taiwan as well as the expansion of NATO.

“In this era of intense competition, changing strategic landscapes, economic coercion and, of course, this very difficult global pandemic, there is no greater global partnership than what we are trying to accomplish through the Quad with Australia, India and Japan,” he said.

Asked if Ukraine would figure at the Quad ministerial, Kritenbrink said, “I think it will be natural for them to address all important issues of the day, and I’m sure Ukraine will be one of them, given the seriousness of the issue and the threat it poses to the rules-based global order.”