The second round of talks between the Quad-Plus countries, on the continuing coronavirus pandemic was held on Friday. The seven countries — India, US, Australia, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and Vietnam — are exploring ways to facilitate trade, sharing technologies and movement of people. Sources said the idea is not only to deal with the ongoing crisis, but also to look forward to see how to put the global economies back on their feet.

Spearheaded by the US, the second weekly conversation had foreign secretary Harsh Shringla representing India while Steve Biegun, deputy secretary, represented the US. The other countries were all represented at the vice-minister level. After the first conversation on March 20, the countries agreed to meet weekly to move decisions forward on the areas of convergence.

The conversation revolved around sharing technologies to combat the virus, including working on vaccines and treatment options, equipment etc.

Spearheaded by the US, it brings together some of the world’s top democracies to deal with the current global crisis, which will seriously impact world economy.

Last week, these seven countries decided they would cooperate on “vaccine development, challenges of stranded citizens, assistance to countries in need and mitigating the impact on the global economy.”

The weekly video-conferences are an attempt to keep the Quad Plus countries within a certain sphere of influence and strategic direction. It is therefore significant to have New Zealand as one of the participants, given it is one of the Five Eyes countries; Vietnam is a valued partner of Japan, India and the US. South Korea is an interesting participant as well, not only as a strategic partner, but also a country which has successfully beaten back the coronavirus challenge.

The call brought the Quad back into focus as one of the key groupings in the Indo-Pacific — one of their areas of collaboration was in humanitarian assistance/disaster relief (HADR). Taking it a step further, these countries, with significant scientific and technological heft, are planning to pool resources to work on emergency areas like vaccines.

