Why in news?
India will hold the official level talks on the ‘Quad’ Asia-Pacific formation on the sidelines of the East Asia Summit in Singapore.
What are the prospects?
- The Quadrilateral Group consists of India, Australia, Japan and the U.S.
- The Quad has a shared objective to ensure and support a “free, open and prosperous” Indo-Pacific region.
- The present meeting comes a year after it was launched in Manila during the ASEAN.
- The discussion will provide an opportunity to exchange ideas about the future of the Asia-Pacific region.
- The meeting is likely to focus on infrastructure projects and on maritime security schemes in the region.
- Building humanitarian disaster response mechanisms is also expected to be on the agenda.
- Japan - India and Japan have recently announced a series of joint projects.
- This is in terms of what they have called the “Asia-Africa growth corridor” in the Indo-Pacific region.
- Among the projects that they will work together on are
- the Jamuna Railway bridge in Bangladesh
- other bridges in northeastern States of India
- housing, school and electricity projects in Rohingya areas in Myanmar
- an LNG plant in Sri Lanka
- a cancer hospital in Kenya
- Australia - Australia has unveiled an ambitious $2 billion project to fund infrastructure.
- There are plans to build maritime and military infrastructure in the Pacific region, where it is willing to cooperate with other Quad members.
- Others - The four countries are expected to talk about other regional developments.
- These include Maldives elections, the collapse of the government in Sri Lanka and the latest developments in North Korea.
What are the challenges ahead?
- Objective - Despite the potential for cooperation, the Quad remains a mechanism without a defined strategic mission.
- In 2007, when the grouping was first formed following cooperation after the 2004 tsunami, the idea was to better coordinate maritime capabilities for disaster situations.
- When revived in 2017, the grouping seemed to have become a counter to China’s growing inroads into the region.
- So Quad members still face the challenge of defining its common agenda.
- Region - A common definition of the geographical area encompassed is yet to be found.
- The US sees itself and India as the extremes of the Indo-Pacific.
- On the other hand, India and Japan have included the oceans up to Africa in their definition.
- The entire focus on the Indo-Pacific makes the Quad a maritime, rather than land-based, grouping.
- This raises questions whether the cooperation extends to the Asia-Pacific and Eurasian regions.
- Maritime - Even on maritime exercises, there is a lack of concurrence.
- E.g. India has not admitted Australia in the Malabar exercises with the U.S. and Japan, despite requests from it.
- It is felt that it would be too early to discuss “militarising” the Quad.
- India has also resisted raising the level of talks from an official to the political level.
- India is the only member not in a treaty alliance with the other Quad countries which could possibly slow down progress.
- Given all, the outcome of the Singapore meet will be judged by the ability of the group to issue a joint declaration, unlike in the last two meets.
Source: The Hindu
