Addressing the press at her daily news conference on March 10th, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki outlined the agenda of the QUAD. “Formed in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami and formalised in 2007, the QUAD has met regularly at the working in foreign minister level. However, Friday will be the first time that the QUAD is meeting at the leader level,” she said.
“That President Biden has made this one of his earliest multilateral engagements speaks to the importance we place on close cooperation with our allies and partners in the Indo-Pacific,” Jen Psaki told reporters.
“A range of issues, course, we expect to be discussed, I should say, facing the global community from the threat of COVID to economic cooperation and, of course, to the climate crisis,” she said.
India has said that the QUAD leaders will discuss regional and global issues of shared interest, and exchange views on practical areas of cooperation towards maintaining a free, open and inclusive Indo-Pacific region.
In a press statement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said that Summit will provide an opportunity to exchange views on contemporary challenges such as resilient supply chains, emerging and critical technologies, maritime security, and climate change.
“The Leaders will discuss ongoing efforts to combat Covid-19 pandemic and explore opportunities for collaboration in ensuring safe, equitable and affordable vaccines in the Indo-Pacific region”, said MEA statement.
“QUAD a grouping that is predicated on shared interests”, US
The US State Department too updated the press about the QUAD virtual summit and the importance of the group on March 9th. State Department spokesperson Ned Price said that the summit will showcase the QUAD’s ability to pool capabilities and build habits of cooperation to address some of those urgent challenges they face. The QUAD is a grouping with important friends and allies of the United States, and it’s a grouping that is predicated on shared interests, Price said.
“I would just note that the QUAD is not about any single challenge. It’s not about any single competitor. This is an entity forged and formed because we share common interests… maritime security is, of course, an important one, but our shared interests go well beyond that. And I think you will see reflected in the agenda the breadth of those shared interests in the aftermath of the QUAD meeting,” he said in response to a question.
“QUAD members are uniquely positioned to help lead the world out of the deep crises that we’ve spoken about recently – and, of course, that includes COVID-19 – and towards the more positive vision that we all seek. And it’s a vision that we in large part share with our fellow QUAD counterparts,” he said.
“There are any number of shared interests. Some of them involve maritime security, global health, climate. I would hesitate to point to one animating challenge that the QUAD is set to address today. We are engaging with the QUAD to take on those collective shared interests that will be relevant in that setting,” Ned Price said.
Price reiterated White House Press Secretary’s comment of Biden adminstration’s importance to the QUAD, saying that this shows the adminstration’s commitment to the Indo-Pacific, he said it is a region that holds tremendous promise for the United States, also tremendous challenge.
“We see ourselves as a Pacific nation. We see ourselves as engaged in this region. We want to deepen that engagement, and this is an important forum with important partners with whom we share a good deal of interest, so it was important for us to demonstrate that early on,” he said.
Aayush Pal 
Shobhil Shrivastava