Jaishankar is traveling to the US for the G20 Foreign Ministers’ Quad meeting this week

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar speaks. File | Photo credit: ANI

A week after US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to India, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar will travel to Atlanta, US to attend the G20 Foreign Ministers’ meeting hosted by Mr. Rubio. The three-day visit from October 29 to 31, Mr Jaishankar’s fourth trip to the US this year, will include meetings with his counterparts from other G20 countries amid a raft of global developments and ongoing conflict in West Asia.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) has not yet announced the visit, but diplomatic sources confirmed that his engagements will include a meeting of the four foreign ministers with Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Japanese Foreign Minister Motegi Toshimitsu, hosted by Mr Rubio in Atlanta.

The Quad ministers earlier met in Delhi in May this year, but were unable to schedule a leaders’ summit in India, which is next in line to host the summit from 2024. Instead, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Donald Trump, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will hold a meeting of the Quad leaders in Manila, located on the outskirts of Sumia in East Asia. mid november In particular, officials are working on ways to move forward three key outcomes of the Quad foreign ministers’ meeting in May, including the Indo-Pacific Maritime Surveillance Initiative, the Quad Critical Minerals Framework and the Quad Indo-Pacific Energy Security Initiative. The decision to hold the Quad leaders’ summit in the Philippines is the first in a non-Quad country and hints at the difficulties the grouping has faced in planning the summit over the past few years.

On the exclusion of South Africa

In Atlanta, many members are also expected to take issue with the US decision to exclude South Africa from the G20 this year due to bilateral tensions. India has not yet commented on the issue, although others such as Russia have criticized the US for the decision, and last week German Chancellor Friedrich Merz called on the US to reverse its decision.

When asked, the official said India has “always supported an inclusive G20”.

All eyes will also be on any possible trilateral talks between Mr Rubio and his Russian counterparts Sergei Lavrov and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi at the G20 ministerial meeting. On Monday (October 26), Mr Trump suggested he was ready to hold a trilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping when he travels to Shenzhen, China, for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit between December 18 and 19, following a visit to Manila.

Mr Trump will host the G20 summit on December 14-15 at the 800-acre Trump National Doral resort owned by the US president. Mr Modi will travel to the US on a three-stop tour, first to Canada from December 11 to 13, then to the US before flying to Brussels, Belgium, where he will sign the India-EU Free Trade Agreement on December 16.

Published – 27 Oct 2026 21:39 IST