Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong has called India a critical and great power in the Indo-Pacificregion. “There is no reshaping of the Indo-Pacific without India. We have seen that India is a civilisational power that brings a different perspective to some of the challenges of these times,” she said in her address at the meeting of QUAD Foreign Ministers in Delhi on March 3.
Wong participated in a meeting presided by Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on the sidelines of Raisina Dialogue 2023. Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken were the other participants of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (QUAD) meeting.
The Australian Foreign Minister also explained how Quad can be a complimentary actor in the Indo-Pacific. “The complementarity of this configuration with the architecture of the region, I think, is demonstrated from the Australian perspective by our geography and by our interest,” said the Australian FM.
Wong said that in terms of geography, Australia is the smallest economy, most southernmost economy, abounded on one side by the Indian Ocean, the other side by the Pacific, ASEAN, and particularly the northern countries of ASEAN. “So for us, our interest lies in a world which is being reshaped, the region which is being reshaped — looking through this and the architecture of the region, which I describe as stable, peaceful, secure and respecting sovereignty,” she added.
