Rubio calls Quad a linchpin but suspense still hangs over summit

The US is deeply committed to the Quad partnership as it is a linchpin and a cornerstone of the US global strategy as a nation, said US secretary of state Marco Rubio after what was the third Quad foreign ministers’ meeting since the return of President Donald Trump to the White House last year.

However, while the Quad foreign ministers’ meeting announced several key initiatives to ensure the grouping remains relevant, it couldn’t lift the suspense over the next leader’s’ summit as the ministers did not broach the issue in their media remarks.

A joint statement later said that they looked forward to the next summit but didn’t specify where it would be held. “We look forward to the convening of the Quad Leaders’ Summit, the next Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, and continuing our engagements that advance peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific and beyond,” said the statement.

This was quite a contrast from the previous foreign ministers’ joint statement in July 2025 that said the next summit would be hosted the same year by India and Australia would host the foreign ministers’ meeting in 2026.

India was initially scheduled to host the Quad summit in 2024. However, India and the US swapped their roles as hosts to accommodate then President Joe Biden’s request to have the summit in his hometown of Wilmington in Delaware, before the end of his presidency.

The India summit never materialised, against the backdrop of fraught India-US ties and Trump’s apparent reluctance to travel to India till the bilateral trade agreement was concluded, and New Delhi instead ended up hosting this week the foreign ministers’ meeting, which was originally planned in Australia.

The absence of a clear pathway to the summit in the foreign ministers’ meeting is likely to reinforce the anxiety about Washington’s commitment to the Quad at the highest level, as Trump works towards a US-China reset as evident from his recent visit to Beijing. A senior Japanese official who briefed the media said there was no discussion in the meeting on Tuesday about the dates and the venue for the summit.

Responding to a question from ToI about how the lack of a full leaders’ summit might impact Quad, Australian foreign minister Penny Wong said Rubio had demonstrated his commitment and that would continue in terms of the leaders' summit. “That depends on the availability of leaders, but we look forward to that. And in the meantime, three foreign ministers' Quad meetings in a very short space of time demonstrates the commitment of all countries to it,” said Wong.

Asked why there was still no clarity about the summit, MEA additional secretary (Americas) Nagaraj Naidu suggested it might be about scheduling constraints. “Leaders’ schedules are difficult to pin down...we leave it to our foreign ministers and they are in touch,” he said. Citing the mention in the joint statement, he also said the leader-level summit would be a great occasion for the government and something it looked forward to.