G20 Summit: India eyes strategic bilateral, trilateral meets; world leaders divided as US-China trade war shrouds event

In an apparent reflection of India’s growing global profile, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be part of two trilateral meetings on the sidelines of G20 summit: The first with leaders of Japan and the US, and the second with leaders of Russia and China. Sources said the trilateral ‘JAI’ between Japan, America and India is the first such meeting while the Russia-India-China (RIC) trilateral — at the Head of Government-level — is taking place after 12 years. However, that aside, this year’s G20 congregation is likely to be a divided lot. With the US-China trade war looming large over the meeting which is being held in Argentina. Trump’s dismissive approach towards the threat of climate change makes it another thorny issue, and member nations will find it difficult to reach a consensus. Here is what to expect at the international summit. [caption id=“attachment_5648111” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] India-specific agenda: New Delhi looks forward to key bilateral, trilateral meets Modi, who arrived in Buenos Aires earlier on Friday, will have a series of bilateral meetings including with Chinese president Xi Jinping. He has already met Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the UN Secretary General António Guterres. Sources said in recent years, Saudi Arabia has been a valuable partner of India and the relationship has expanded beyond the Indian community to issues related to the economy, energy and security. All issues of bilateral and regional interest were discussed, they said. They said that UN secretary general has reached out to Modi for the second time in two months. Both leaders have been giving a lot of importance to the issue of climate change and the outreach is taking place just a week before COP24, the 24th annual UN climate conference in Katowice, Poland. Sources said the meeting was a reflection of the respect for India’s initiatives on issues of global importance. They said the timing of trilateral meetings is directly related to period of major global developments and is indicative of India’s growing diplomatic and economic profile in the world. The sources said it was a recognition of several aspects such as India being a factor of stability in the region and it being a “global engine of economic growth.” Meanwhile, the meeting of foreign ministers of India, Russia and China is another strategic development to look out for. Russia, a longtime partner of India, has been drifting closer to China and Pakistan in view of India warming up to US. Also in the backdrop are both Russia and China’s developing tensions with the US for separate reasons. The meeting is crucial for India to warm up ties with the two Communist nations, in the face of an emerging multi-polar world order. According to two Indian officials, the three foreign ministers could likely agree on further official level meetings in this format that would strengthen coordination and understanding,  Livemint reported. Apart from this, in the bilateral meeting with China, Modi is expected to take up key issues like Pakistan-backed terrorism, including Masood Azhar’s name in UN’s list of terrorists, and the thorny issue of China’s controversial China Pakistan Economic Corridor passing through disputed territory under Pakistani occupation. India is also expected to discuss, mainly with Russia, the fast tracking of the 7,200km-long International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) linking India, Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia with Europe. Also, on cards is a trilateral meet between India Japan, and US aimed at meeting the challenges posed by a rising Chinese influence and safeguarding the three nation’s common interests in a coherent Indo-Pacific strategic region. The meeting comes in the backdrop of resumption of the abandoned “quad” talks between the above three nations, with the addition of Australia. The meetings, first initiated in 2007, were suspended possibly over Chinese displeasure, at a time when India’s ties with it were hit by border dispute. China has been warily eyeing the resumption of the “quadrilateral exchanges” while stating its hope that the group and its actions were not directed against Beijing. The talks also hold importance for New Delhi as both Japan and US have improved security cooperation with it over the past few years. While the US upgraded India’s status to ‘major defense partner," granting New Delhi access to certain sensitive defense technologies, during a summit meeting earlier this year in Japan, Modi and Abe announced that the two sides would soon start talks on an Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA) that would give the armed forces of both sides reciprocal access to the others’ facilities for logistics and resupply, according to  The Diplomat. Global agenda: World leaders a divided lot this G20 summit G20 member nations were still struggling to reach agreement on major issues including trade, migration and climate change as world leaders began arriving in the Argentine capital ahead of a summit starting on Friday. “This is not a good year for multilateralism,” said a German government source about talks on a final statement that the leaders are due to issue at the end of their meeting on Saturday. The negotiations are “very, very difficult,” the official told Reuters. Meanwhile, global trade tensions, fuelled by Trump’s launch of a trade war against China, are expected to dominate this year’s gathering of the Group of 20, an unwieldy club of the world’s industrialised countries. Financial and commodities markets are closely watching the outcome of the summit, especially the planned meeting between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping on Saturday. A slowdown in the global economy will worsen if Trump presses ahead with plans to further increase tariffs on some $200 billion of Chinese imports to 25 percent, OECD Secretary General Angel Gurria told Reuters. Gurria said the impact of existing US trade tariffs of 10 percent on Chinese goods amounted to a loss of 0.2 percent of global gross domestic product by 2020. “If you jack the tariffs up to 25 percent and then others retaliate, the impact could go all the way up to almost one percent,” he said. Argentina, this year’s G20 president, has stressed the importance of the summit as a consensus-building forum. But the divisions have only highlighted how fractured the grouping has become on key global issues. “After two-and-a-half days of talks and very short nights, some two-thirds of the paragraphs have been okayed,” said a G20 official involved in drafting the statement. “Now, trade, climate, migrants, refugees, multilateralism, steel - which are really the thorny issues - remain without agreement.” An Asian delegate told Reuters the closed-door discussions were “moving very very slowly - so slowly that I think we will have to stay in this room past midnight, again.” Financial markets though are less concerned about the ability of the leaders to present a united front and more anxious about the outcome of key bilateral meetings. Wall Street edged lower on Thursday amid jitters over Trump’s meeting with Xi. Trump said on Thursday he was open to a trade deal with China but was not sure he wanted one. “I think we’re very close to doing something with China but I don’t know that I want to do it,” Trump told reporters. China, for its part, is hoping for “positive results” in resolving the trade dispute with the United States, the commerce ministry said on Thursday. Another bilateral meet, that stopped short of taking place will dominate the discourse around G20 summit. Trump on Thursday abruptly cancelled his planned bilateral talks with Russian president Vladimir Putin, citing Russia’s seizure of Ukrainian vessels. A Russian diplomatic source said afterwards that Trump and Putin still needed to meet to discuss the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty. Trump’s administration has accused Russia of non-compliance with the 31-year-old missile accord and warned it will pull out of the deal as a result. The Kremlin denies violating the pact. “We still have to discuss the INF. This is important. We still need a full scale meeting,” the source told Reuters. This year’s G20 summit is also grappling with how to handle the presence of Mohammed bin Salman. Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler arrived in Buenos Aires on Wednesday under a cloud of controversy over the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in a Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October. Argentine president Mauricio Macri said the allegations against the prince may be discussed during the G20 Summit. Saudi Arabia has said he had no prior knowledge of the murder. With inputs from agencies