‘We will act against terror perpetrators, their supporters and enablers’: EAM Jaishankar

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said in Washington, DC, on Wednesday that India communicated very clearly to the leaders of Quad partner nations what it means when it says there is zero tolerance for terrorism and that now it’s for the terrorist groups and their sponsors to understand those messages. Addressing a press conference after the Quad meeting, Jaishankar said, “...What we have communicated very clearly is we mean it when we say there is zero tolerance for terrorism...If you look back at the Prime Minister’s address to the nation after the cessation of firing on the 10th of May, there were some very clear messages which came out of that...It’s really for the terrorist groupings and for their sponsors to absorb and reflect on those messages. I don’t think we are going to spell out if this happens, we will do that. I mean, no government does that.”

“With each of my counterparts, I have shared with them the sense that the nature of the terrorists challenge, the fact that we have confronted it over multiple decades and that we are very resolved today to respond to it very firmly and we have the right to defend ourselves...The perpetrators of terrorism must be held accountable, they must be brought to justice and that’s important because we have to communicate to the world that what we did on 7th May, the objective of Operation Sindoor is that if there are terrorist attacks, we will act against the perpetrators, the supporters, the enablers. That message was conveyed with great clarity.”

‘Had a good meeting with Marco Rubio’

Reflecting on his meetings with his counterparts from Quad member nations, Jaishankar said, “In terms of my bilateral meetings. I had a good session with the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and we essentially did a stocktaking of the last six months and what to do to look ahead... This included a discussion on trade, investment, technology, defence, security, energy, and mobility.”

“Now, defence and energy are two subjects where, particularly with the US, which are substantive enough to warrant a separate meeting with their secretaries, which is why I had a meeting with the US Secretary of Defence, Pete Hegseth...I also had very useful conversations with my other two counterparts. Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Japan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Takeshi Iwaya,” he added.

‘We discussed Israel-Iran conflict and what the US had done in Iran’

Jaishankar further said that all the Quad ministers agreed strongly that the goal was to strengthen strategic stability in the Indo-Pacific.

He added, “We had a very open discussion on regional issues of the Indo-Pacific...In the light of recent developments, it is natural that we also spent some time discussing the Israel-Iran conflict also what the US had done in Iran.”

He also shared that there was in parallel a Quad business roundtable on critical minerals, and companies from all four Quad nations were present at that roundtable.

‘We launched the Quad Critical Minerals initiative’

“We launched the Quad Critical Minerals initiative and this would be focused particularly on the mineral recovery, which is very important for all of us. Second, there is the Quad Indo-Pacific Logistics Network that was launched earlier in the year and we decided it will hold its field training exercise very soon,” he added.

The EAM also lauded Operation Sindoor outreach by the all-party delegations including representatives of different political parties who formed a highly qualified group of leaders, and said they sent a unified message to the world, and that he is proud of them not just as a minister, but also as an Indian citizen.

It was India’s “political pluralism” coming together for a common cause in the national interest, which was great, he added.