‘Everyone liked it a great deal,’ says Biden on first-ever Quad summit
WASHINGTON/BEIJING: US President Joe Biden is pleased with the outcome of the historic first summit-level meeting of the Quad on Friday, one of his most significant foreign policy initiatives since taking office less than two months ago.
“It went very well,” Biden told reporters when asked how the Quad summit was. “Everyone seemed to like it a great deal.”
Biden and his counterparts Prime Ministers Narendra Modi of India, Scott Morrison of Australia and Yoshihide Suga of Japan - made history by getting together virtually for the first summit of the four-nation grouping, which they have described as a “flexible group of like-minded partners”.
They also announced a major vaccine initiative to battle Covid-19 in Indo-Pacific countries facing acute shortage of vaccines; and set up working groups on coronavirus vaccines, climate and emerging technologies that clearly set up mechanisms for long-term and open-ended engagement. And they signed off on a joint statement and a factsheet.
The day after, they lent their bylines to a joint op-ed in The Washington Post portraying their partnership as a “spark of hope”. They explained in detail what they did last Friday and what they intend to do going forward. They assured the rest of the world they are not an exclusive club and that they will “work with all of those who share” their goals, chiefly, a free and open Indo-Pacific.
Work began on the summit early February, according to people familiar with its planning and execution, and continued at a frenetic pace since even as their respective nations fought the deadly Covid-19 pandemic at home.
“These last few weeks were complete madness, and unending series of meetings and exchange of notes and documents,” said one of those involved.
China says Quad will ‘end up nowhere’
China on Monday said the Quad “will end up nowhere” if it does not abandon its ideological bias and Cold War mentality but instead forms cliques, reiterating its opposition to the seemingly anti-China stance taken by the bloc.
Friday’s summit was closely monitored and critiqued by Beijing. China was riled after US national security adviser Jake Sullivan said at the summit the four Quad leaders discussed the challenge posed by China.
Asked to respond, the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said the China-threat is exaggerated. “For some time, some countries have been exaggerating the so-called China threat, China challenges to drive a wedge among regional countries to sow a discord between their relations with China,” Zhao said on Monday.
“What they have done is against the trend of times which is peace development and winwin cooperation and runs counter to the common aspirations of people in the region.”
“They will gain no support and will end up nowhere,” the spokesperson said, repeating the same words later in the press conference to another question.