2+2 Ministerial Dialogue | |
|---|---|
| Official languages | |
| Membership |  India United States Japan Australia Russia United Kingdom Brazil |
.jpg)
The2+2 Ministerial Dialogue is a diplomatic summit that has been held every year since 2018 initially between theMinister of External Affairs or Foreign Minister, andDefence Minister ofIndia with theSecretary of State andSecretary of Defense of theUnited States to discuss and work on common issues of concern to improve and strengthenIndia–United States relations.
In 2019, the summit involved the respective Foreign and Defence ministers between both India andJapan. In 2021, the summit was expanded to meetings with the Foreign and Defence ministers ofAustralia andRussia.
The dialogue came to existence from an agreement betweenPrime MinisterNarendra Modi andPresidentDonald Trump. The dialogue was created to replace theStrategic and Commercial Dialogue which started under theObama administration. Both nations agreed to the summit during Modi's visit to the United States in June 2017 which was officially announced the following month in August after a phone call between Modi and Trump.[1]
The first summit was supposed to be held on July 6, 2018, inWashington, D.C., but had been postponed by India's Defence Minister,Nirmala Sitharaman, citing "unavoidable reasons".[2] This was the third time the dialogue was postponed.[3]
The first summit was held on September 6 between the Minister of External Affairs,Sushma Swaraj, Defence Minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, Secretary of StateMike Pompeo, and Secretary of DefenseJim Mattis inNew Delhi. The meeting between both sides reaffirmed the U.S.'s designation of India as a "Major Defense Partner". India was granted license-free exports, re-exports, and transfers under the License Exception Strategic Trade Authorization. India and the U.S. signed a Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement which facilitates interoperability between militaries and sale of high-end technology. The summit resulted in both sides beginning negotiations for the Industrial Security Annex which would allow U.S. defense firms to sell military equipment to Indian partners.
Among other things that were agreed upon was continuing to deepen cooperation in counterterrorism,facilitate peace inAfghanistan, increase further economic cooperation, and the establishment of six nuclear power plans in India betweenNuclear Power Corporation of India andWestinghouse Electric Company. Representatives from both countries agreed to turn the meeting into an annual affair.[4]
.jpg)
The second summit was held on December 18 in Washington, D.C., between Mike Pompeo, Secretary of DefenseMark Esper, Minister of External Affairs,S. Jaishankar, and Minister of DefenseRajnath Singh.[5] The meeting revolved most of the areas of concern from the previous year. The ministers and secretaries welcomed theQuadrilateral Security Dialogue that was held between India, the United States, Australia, andJapan in September.[6]
The meeting resulted in both countries signing the Industrial Security Annex which allowed one-hundred and fourteen fighter jets to be sold to India. Both sides were still negotiating the final details of signing the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-spatial Cooperation agreement.[7]
The third summit was held on October 27 in New Delhi where both sides announced the signing of the Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement for Geo-spatial Cooperation and with the United States vowing to support India's "territorial sovereignty and liberty" which was a response to theMay skirmishes between India andChina's armed forces at the disputed region of their border known as theLine of Actual Control. Secretary Pompeo described theChinese Communist Party as "no friend to democracy". Both sides also discussed combating theCOVID-19 pandemic.[8]
In November, it was announced that the fourth meeting between India and the U.S. would be held in November and have the possibility of both Narendra Modi and PresidentJoe Biden meeting in Washington, but no date was set for the summit.[9] In October, officials from both countries had discussed regional issues during the sixteenth US-India Defence Policy Group meeting that was said to lay the groundwork for the next 2+2 dialogue.[10]
On December 16, the Minister of External Affairs spokesperson, Arindam Bagchi, announced that a 2+2 was unlikely to be held in 2021 as details including a date had yet to be finalized.[11] However, no 2+2 summit was held in 2021.
In March, it was announced that India and the U.S. would hold the 2+2 meeting in Washington, D.C., on April 11 between External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, Secretary of StateAntony Blinken, and Secretary of DefenseLloyd Austin.[12] Singh was expected to be in the U.S. from April 10 to 13.[13] The summit was held in Washington on April 11, with both sides looking forward to India hosting the next summit.[14]
After the summit, Antony Blinken remarked during the press conference that the U.S. was monitoring the rise in abuses of human rights in India.[15] Three days later on the thirteenth, Jaishankar rebuked that India had concerns about human rights in the U.S. citing hate crimes against members of the Indian community in New York. But mainly attributed the attacks on human rights in India under the premiership of Narendra Modi to "lobbies and the vote banks which drive that."[16]
On November 30, 2019, India and Japan held their first 2+2 meeting in New Delhi betweenJapanese Foreign Affairs MinisterToshimitsu Motegi,Defense MinisterTaro Kono, Minister of External Affairs, S. Jaishankar, and Minister of Defense Rajnath Singh.[17]
The meeting was seen as a deepening of relations between India and Japan in light of their mutual tension withChina and concern with China's assertiveness in expanding not only its influence but also control in regional issues.[18]
In April 2022, it was announced that India and Japan would hold their second 2+2 meeting in Tokyo in mid-April with Singh and S. Jaishankar meeting with their counterparts Defence MinisterNobuo Kishi and Foreign MinisterYoshimasa Hayashi.[13] However, no meeting was held in Tokyo as instead the meeting was changed to take place in September.[19] The meeting took place on September 8 in Tokyo with S. Jaishankar and Rajnath Singh meeting with Prime MinisterFumio Kishida.[20]
From September 10 to 12, 2021, India and Australia, held their first 2+2 summit.[21]
India was represented by the Minister of External Affairs, S. Jaishankar, and Minister of Defense Rajnath Singh. Australia was represented byMinister of Foreign AffairsMarise Payne andDefense MinisterPeter Dutton. The summit was held in New Delhi, with both countries sharing mutual interests with the United States and Japan over China's ambitions. Both sides held the forum after Narendra Modi andAustralian Prime MinisterScott Morrison agreed to upgrade the relations to Comprehensive Strategic Partnership after a virtual summit in June 2020.[22]
Both sides agreed to further expand cooperation by holding the summit once every two years.[23]
On November 26, 2021, it was announced India and Russia would hold a 2+2 summit on December 6 withRussian Minister of Foreign AffairsSergey Lavrov andDefence MinisterSergei Shoigu with their respective Indian counterparts S. Jaishankar and Rajnath Singh. The meeting included the possibility ofRussian PresidentVladimir Putin visiting India meeting with Narendra Modi during the summit.[24] The agreement for such a summit was made in agreement during a phone call on April 28 between Putin and Modi.[25] Lavrov described the summit by stating, "I'm confident that the new mechanism is going to turn into an efficient dialogue platform to talk about a wide range of regional and international topics a little further deepening our traditional, mutual understanding. It'll help reinforce our specially privileged strategic partnership between our countries".[26]
Putin arrived in India for the 21st India-Russia Annual Summit in New Delhi on December 6, which was being held along with the 2+2 summit. An agreement was reached by both sides with India producing more than six hundred thousandKalashnikov rifles and a military and technical cooperation pact was agreed upon lasting until 2031 which included a pledge to boost annual trade to thirty billion dollars by 2025.[27]
The inaugural India-UK 2+2 Foreign and Defence Dialogue was held in New Delhi on 16 October 2023. The Indian delegation was co-chaired byPiyush Srivastava, Joint Secretary Europe West, andVishwesh Negi, Joint Secretary, International Cooperation. The UK delegation was co-chaired byBen Mellor, India Director, Indian Ocean Directorate andRobert Magowan, Deputy Chief of Defence Staff, Finance and Military Capability.[28]
| Africa |  | |
|---|---|---|
| Americas | ||
| Asia | ||
| Europe | ||
| Oceania | ||
| Former | ||
| Multilateral relations | ||
| Related | ||
|  | |||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Diplomatic posts |
|
|---|---|
| Diplomacy | |
| Incidents |
|
| Military relations | |
| Related |
|
