After New Delhi hosted two acrimonious meetings of G-20 ministers that ended without being able to issue a consensual statement criticizing the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Indian capital, which this week became the new global epicenter of diplomacy, was also the host. this Friday from a meeting between the foreign ministers of the revived Quad (Quadrilateral Security Dialogue) group, an alliance made up of the United States, India, Australia and Japan, originally seen as a military counterweight to China’s growing influence in the Pacific.
This time, unlike other meetings, China went into the background of the shots of the representatives of the Quad, who, still with the hangover from the failed meeting of the big economies the day before, aimed the main criticism at Vladimir Putin. “The threat of nuclear weapons in Ukraine is inadmissible,” the joint statement denounced, referring to the historic nuclear arms control treaty that the Russian leader suspended in February.
“If we allow Russia to do what it is doing in Ukraine with impunity, then that is a message to would-be aggressors everywhere that they too can get away with it,” said US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
On Thursday, the leader of US diplomacy had his first meeting since the war in Ukraine began, for just 10 minutes, with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, whom he asked for his country to end the invasion. Putin’s envoy, cornered yesterday by attacks by representatives of Western powers, said today that the G-20 had lost its “main role as a forum for economic debate” by focusing on the war in Ukraine.
Lavrov also charged against the Quad, accusing the group of wanting to militarize and ally with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to isolate Moscow and Beijing in the region.
The Quad was born as a simple mutual aid association after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, when the four countries came together to provide humanitarian assistance. The alliance was formalized in 2007 by then Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, but was inactivated a few months later when Australia announced its withdrawal to strengthen trade ties with China. It took until 2017 to see the group resurrect in response to Beijing’s growing regional influence.
“We strongly oppose any unilateral action that seeks to change the status quo or increase tensions in the area,” also read the statement on Friday, signed by the members of the Quad, in clear reference to China and its threat to invade Taiwan.
“We express serious concern about the militarization of disputed features, the dangerous use of coast guard ships and maritime militias, and efforts to disrupt other countries’ offshore resource exploitation activities,” it said. another message addressed to the Asian giant, which claims its sovereignty over almost the entire disputed South China Sea.
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