US President Joe Biden, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Australia’s Anthony Albanese and Japan’s Fumio Kishida will meet on the sidelines of the ongoing G7 summit, White House press secretary Karen Jean-Pierre, who is traveling with the US delegation in Japan, said on Friday.
“Besides sharing strategic assessments, leaders will welcome new forms of quadripartite cooperation on secure digital technology, submarine cables, infrastructure capacity building, and maritime space awareness,” Jean-Pierre said, adding, “President Biden thanks Prime Minister Albanese, as well as two prime ministers.” Japan and India, for their flexibility, and looking forward to rescheduling his trip.”
Biden was earlier to travel to Australia from Japan for a bilateral summit with Albanese and a four-way summit, which Modi and Kishida joined. But he canceled that stage because, as the White House said, he needed to return to Washington to negotiate a budget deal with the Republicans to raise America’s debt limit and prevent it from defaulting, which could have dire consequences not only for the United States but also for the United States. the whole world. Both sides have until June 1 to reach an agreement.
The cancellation of Biden’s visit to Australia has raised questions about America’s commitment to the Quartet, which has had a checkered history — it took off as a group to organize relief and rehabilitation efforts in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami, and collapsed in 2008 when Australia withdrew. , bowing to Chinese pressure; It was revived by the Donald Trump administration with an official-level meeting in 2017 and quickly grew into meetings of the foreign ministers of the four countries and into a summit-level meeting in January 2021, although it was held virtually.
The first in-person meeting at the summit level took place in September 2021 in Washington, D.C. and lasted more than two hours, according to a schedule released at the time by the White House on the president’s engagements. Biden and Modi were joined by then Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and then Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga.
It was also a good time for the summit to take place in the United States as the leaders were all expected to be in the country for the annual UN General Assembly meetings in New York. Biden also held his first in-person, bilateral meetings with each of the three leaders, after he took charge earlier in the year.
The second face-to-face quadripartite summit was held in May 2022 in Tokyo. And the four leaders spent a lot of time together, according to the White House schedule of the US president. Biden, Moody, Albanese, and Kishida first met as a two-hour group and then together launched an app for the foursome and continued to a working lunch.
The third in-person summit, which is being held in Hiroshima on the sidelines of the G-7 summit to which invited leaders from non-member countries such as India and Australia are to be joined, is scheduled to start at 8.05 pm local time, according to A. The White House schedule, and the President and First Lady Jill Biden are scheduled to leave together for dinner with the G-7 and invited leaders at 8.45 p.m.
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