Australia, US support Quad

WASHINGTON: The US and Australia have “welcomed” the recent meeting of an informal consultative body they form with India and Japan, called the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue — a move that will be heard and noted in New Delhi as it weighs its options about the grouping.

US secretary of state Mike Pompeo and secretary of defence James Mattis hosted their Australian counterparts Julie Bishop and Marise Payne at a two-day ministerial held at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. Their version of the 2+2 annual meeting, called Australia-us Ministerial Consultations (AUSMIN), ended on Tuesday.

“They welcomed the recent Us-australia-india-japan consultations on the Indo-pacific in Singapore,” a joint statement issued on Tuesday said.

Started in 2007, the Quad disintegrated after Australia pulled out for fear of upsetting China, which continues to view the quad as a body committed to containing and countering its influence. It was renewed last year and officials of the four countries met for the first time at a “working level” on the sidelines of the ASEAN meetings in Manila in November.

A second meeting of senior officials took place in Singapore in June. But an impression had begun gaining ground around then that New Delhi seemed less interested. “New Delhi may be getting cold feet,” Derek Grossman, a former US defence department official and an expert with think tank RAND Corporation, argued recently.