Quad Meeting In Saudi Arabia
Context:
Mohammad Bin Salman, the Saudi prince and prime minister, hosted a special conference of the national security advisers (NSAs) of India, the United States, and the United Arab Emirates on Sunday in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This meeting is being hailed as another significant “Quad” in West Asia.
Points To Ponder:
- To discuss regional infrastructure initiatives, Saudi Prince and Prime Minister Mohammad Bin Salman (MbS) hosted a special conference of the National Security Advisors (NSAs) of India, the United States, and the United Arab Emirates on Sunday. It was promoted as being yet another significant “Quad” in West Asia.
- The gathering aimed to foster the idea of a Middle East region connected to India and the rest of the world, one that is more secure and affluent. The leaders talked about how to improve connections and ties between their nations in a way that promotes stability and progress in the area.
- Ajit Doval, the national security adviser for India, Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser for the United States, and Sheikh Tahnoun, the deputy ruler of Abu Dhabi, were there.
- The fact that the meeting took place a week after Ajit Doval’s trip to Iran, which recently agreed to reestablish relations in a meeting mediated by Beijing, made it noteworthy.
- The Saudi Arabian government and the U.S. government both released official statements on the discussions, but the MEA and the National Security Council made no comments regarding Mr Doval’s visits.
- One of the meetings scheduled over the next weeks is specifically between Mr Sullivan and Mr Doval to prepare for the impending talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Joseph Biden this month as well as the PM’s state visit to the U.S. in June.
- Mr Doval travelled to Jeddah for the quadrilateral summit, which was intended to challenge China’s Belt and Road Initiative and other incursions in the area. A plan to connect the Gulf nations with India via shipping channels from “two ports” in the area was one of the initiatives proposed.
- The infrastructure meetings, which come months after Beijing negotiated a breakthrough in relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran, were reportedly intended to serve as a response to China’s Belt and Road Initiative and other inroads in the area, according to U.S. officials.
- On May 11, U.S. Ambassador Eric Garcetti will finally hand over his credentials to President Droupadi Murmu and is anticipated to start official talks about state visit preparations.
- Mr Modi is scheduled to visit Papua New Guinea on a bilateral basis, Hiroshima as part of the G-7 outreach to other nations, and the US-India-Australia-Japan Quad summit in Sydney later this month, when he will meet Mr Biden.
- Mr Doval has several high-profile engagements abroad, including a trip to Saudi Arabia. Last Monday, he was in Tehran where he met with the Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi, the national security adviser Shamkhani, and the foreign minister Hossein Amirabdollahian.
- Before his trip, Mr Sullivan gave a speech at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in which he explained that the meetings he would be attending in Saudi Arabia were intended to “discuss new areas of cooperation between New Delhi and the Gulf as well as the United States and the rest of the region, fueled in part by the comprehensive economic partnership signed last year between India and the UAE.”
