EAM Jaishankar on rise of China, Quad shouldn’t be seen as a ganging up

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Oct 01 2021 02:55 PM
P C Thomas

EAM Jaishankar on rise of China, Quad shouldn’t be seen as a ganging up

Washington: External Affairs Minister (EAM) S Jaishankar said on Friday that while the rise of China has had a very fundamental impact on the international order, the Quad should not be seen as “some kind of ganging up and negatively driven” and that the Quad is “not against somebody”.

In a discussion at the US-India Strategic Partnership Forum, when asked by Ambassador Frank Wisner how India perceives the threat level due to the situation in Afghanistan, Jaishankar, in an oblique criticism of the US for keeping India out of the Doha talks, said: “I think to some degree we would all be justified in having levels of concern over Afghanistan, and to some degree I think the jury is still out. “When I say levels of concern, there were commitments which were made by the Taliban at Doha, the US knows that best, we were not taken into confidence into various aspects of that,” he said.

On the Quad, against the backdrop of the first in-person Leaders’ summit held in Washington on September 24, he said: “The beauty of Quad is precisely because it is not rigid, it’s not formal, it’s very comfortable and easy-going, and the agenda is made up responding to the requirements of the times. I see it as a new model of cooperation among like-minded countries.”