Leaders at the Quad Leaders Summit in Wilmington, USA on September 22, 2024.
Wilmington: The Quad nations comprising the United States of America (USA), India, Japan and Australia today announced a plan to launch a first-ever Quad-at-Sea Ship Observer Mission in 2025.
The mission will comprise the US Coast Guard, Japan Coast Guard, Australian Border Force, and Indian Coast Guard, to improve interoperability and advance maritime safety, and continue with further missions in future years across the Indo-Pacific.
Quad nations also announced a new regional Maritime Initiative for Training in the Indo-Pacific (MAITRI), to enable their partners in the region to maximize tools provided through the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA), which was announced by Quad members in 2022, and other Quad partner initiatives, to monitor and secure their waters, enforce their laws, and deter unlawful behaviour. India will host the inaugural MAITRI workshop in 2025.
Quad nations further announced today the launch of a Quad Indo-Pacific Logistics Network pilot project, to pursue shared airlift capacity among our nations and leverage our collective logistics strengths, to support civilian response to natural disasters more rapidly and efficiently across the Indo-Pacific region.
These announcements were made in a joint statement by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of Australia, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, Prime Minister Kishida Fumio of Japan, and President Joseph R. Biden of the United States, after their meeting at the fourth in-person Quad Leaders Summit, hosted by President Biden in Wilmington, Delaware.
They also announced the Quad Cancer Moonshot, a groundbreaking partnership to save lives in the Indo-Pacific region. Besides, the Quad Ports of the Future Partnership was also announced, which will harness the Quad’s expertise to support sustainable and resilient port infrastructure development across the Indo-Pacific, in collaboration with regional partners. In 2025, the Quad nations intend to hold a Quad Regional Ports and Transportation Conference, hosted by India in Mumbai. Through this new partnership, Quad partners intend to coordinate, exchange information, share best practices with partners in the region, and leverage resources to mobilize government and private sector investments in quality port infrastructure across the Indo-Pacific region.
Last year, Quad partners launched a landmark initiative to deploy the first Open Radio Access Network (RAN) in the Pacific, in Palau, to support a secure, resilient, and interconnected telecommunications ecosystem. Since then, the Quad has pledged approximately $20 million to this effort. Today, they announced an “ambitious expansion” of their partnership to deliver trusted technology solutions to the broader Indo-Pacific region.
During the Summit, India announced a new initiative to award fifty Quad scholarships, worth $500,000, to students from the Indo-Pacific to pursue a 4-year undergraduate engineering programme at a Government of India-funded technical institution. Quad members also welcomed India’s establishment of a space-based web portal for Mauritius, to support the concept of open science for space-based monitoring of extreme weather events and climate impact.
Over the past four years, Quad Leaders have met together six times, including twice virtually, and Quad Foreign Ministers have met eight times in the last five years. Quad country representatives meet together on a regular basis, at all levels, including among ambassadors across the four countries’ extensive diplomatic networks, to consult one another, exchange ideas to advance shared priorities, and deliver benefits with and for partners across the Indo-Pacific region.
– global bihari bureau
