New Delhi: Indian Ministry of External Affairs has issued a statement claiming that the QUAD leaders will hold a virtual meeting today following their September summit in Washington to discuss important developments in the Indo-Pacific. However, it was not clear whether or not the Ukraine crisis would be taken into consideration.
PM @narendramodi will participate along with President of USA @POTUS @JoeBiden, Prime Minister of Australia @ScottMorrisonMP, and Prime Minister of Japan @kishida230 in a Quad Leaders' virtual meeting today.
Press Release ➡️ https://t.co/jEFRFrOiGH
— Randhir Jaiswal (@MEAIndia) March 3, 2022
The announcement of the meeting came as a surprise as none of the leaders had flagged it earlier.
However, the meeting is going to be crucial considering the ongoing war in Ukraine, and the fact that India is the only country from the group that has not yet condemned the aggression of Russia, the leading arms supplier for the Indian military.
Biden was originally scheduled to attend a summit of the grouping in May. Quad foreign ministers met in Australia early last month and pledged to deepen cooperation to ensure the Indo-Pacific region was free from “coercion”, a swipe at China’s economic and military activities.
