Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo has described Quad and Aukus as “companions and not rivals” to the Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean).
The obvious change of coronary heart, which comes forward of the May 24 Quad summit in Sydney, is being seen as a constructive in India that shares a typical maritime boundary with Indonesia.
Quad stands for the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, which contains India, the US, Australia and Japan, whereas Aukus is a safety partnership between Australia, the UK and the US.
When Aukus was first introduced, Indonesia-the largest nation in Southeast Asia-had expressed reservations that this might result in an arms race within the Indo-Pacific area.
China has been describing Quad as a bloc akin to Nato, though Quad is not a army alliance and India has no plans to enter right into a army pact within the area.
