Opening Remarks by EAM, Dr. S. Jaishankar at the Third India-Japan 2+2 Ministerial Meeting (20 August 2024)

Excellencies

It is a great pleasure to welcome you and your delegations to India. We do 2+2 with select partners and the meeting itself has a very unique place in our relationship. I am very glad that the Prime Minister could receive both your Excellencies yesterday and share his thoughts on India Japan relations.

In the last decade, our relationship has assumed the form of a Special Strategic and Global Partnership. The logic of this evolution is our expanding interests and growing activities. As we both step forward into a more volatile and unpredictable world, there is a need for reliable partners with whom there are substantial convergences.

As a result, we have consciously sought to facilitate each other's endeavours, comprehend each other's objectives, strengthen each other's positions and work with other nations of shared comfort. Our Strategic Partnership will continue to grow as we embrace mutuality and display sensitivity.

Our cooperation is today set against a larger context of a free, open and rules-based Indo-Pacific . For India, this is a natural extrapolation from our Act East policy. Indeed, the proportion of our activities and interests East of India has been steadily growing.

Excellencies,

We mark the 10th anniversary of our Special Strategic and Global Partnership. The 2+2 must particularly focus on the steps ahead. It is two years since we last met in Tokyo. There have been many developments of consequence in the world. Our own relationship also has to factor in changes in our own capabilities and calculations.

I look forward to discussing all these developments at the meeting.

Thank You