(Washington) The head of American diplomacy Antony Blinken is going to the Pacific next week for a meeting in Melbourne of the “Quad”, the alliance of the United States with Australia, India and Japan dedicated in particular to counter China, the State Department announced on Friday.
Posted at 10:35 a.m.
His tour, from Wednesday to Saturday, will also take him to the Fiji Islands, then to Hawaii for a meeting devoted in particular to North Korea.
AUSTRALIAN NAVY PHOTO
An Australian destroyer and an American destroyer during joint maneuvers in the Pacific.
In Australia, the Secretary of State will therefore participate in the fourth ministerial meeting of the “Quad”, devoted to the many common challenges, including COVID-19, climate change, but also “maritime security”, according to a press release from his services. .
US President Joe Biden last year organized the first summits of this alliance revived by his predecessor Donald Trump to promote a democratic, stable and secure Asia-Pacific region.
If China is not mentioned directly in the press release from the State Department, the “Quad” has in the minds of the Americans the objective of displaying a united front in the face of the emergence of Beijing, accused in particular of intimidation and expansionism in the South China Sea.
On his way back, on February 12, Antony Blinken will be the first secretary of state to visit Fiji since 1985, to promote a “free and open Indo-Pacific” region, Washington’s mantra to contain Beijing’s growing ambitions.
The tour will end the same day in Honolulu, Hawaii, where he will chair a meeting with his counterparts from Japan and South Korea to “deepen” their “cooperation” in the face of the renewed nuclear threat from North Korea, which has increased in recent weeks the missile tests condemned by the international community.