Marco Rubio to arrive tomorrow for Quad huddle on May 26

“In keeping with the Quad vision for a free and open Indo-Pacific, the Ministers will build on discussions held in Washington, D.C. on 1 July 2025. They will exchange views on advancing Quad cooperation across priority areas, review progress on ongoing Quad initiatives, and reflect on recent developments in the Indo-Pacific region and other international issues of mutual concern,” it said.

During their visit to New Delhi, the Foreign Ministers are also expected to hold bilateral meetings with the External Affairs Minister and call on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the MEA said.

US State Department spokesperson Thomas ‘Tommy’ Pigott, in a statement, said, “Secretary Rubio will travel to India from May 23-26, where he will visit Kolkata, Agra, Jaipur, and New Delhi. The Secretary will discuss energy security, trade, and defense cooperation during meetings with senior Indian officials.”

Ahead of the visit, Rubio said the US is ready to sell as much energy as India is willing to buy.

Interacting with reporters in Miami before heading out to Sweden and India, he described India as a “great partner” and said his visit was important as it would give him an opportunity to meet with ministers from the Quad nations.

“Well, we want to sell them as much energy as they’ll buy. And obviously, you’ve seen, I think, we’re at historic levels of US production, and US export,” he said.

“We want to be able to do more. We were already in talks with them to do more. We want them to be a bigger part of their portfolio. We also think there are opportunities with Venezuelan oil,” he said.

Rubio described India as a “great partner” and said his visit to New Delhi was important as it would also give him an opportunity to meet with ministers from the Quad nations.

“They are a great ally, a great partner. We do a lot of good work with them. And so it is an important trip. I’m glad we’re able to do it because I think there’ll be a lot for us to talk about,” he said.

“We’ll also meet with Quad there, which is important. I think my first meeting as Secretary of State was with the Quad. I’m glad we are able to do it now in India and we’re going to do one later in the year as well,” he said.

Rubio said the acting President of Venezuela Delcy Rodriguez was also scheduled to visit India next week and there will be many opportunities to work with New Delhi.

“In fact, it’s my understanding that the interim President of Venezuela will be travelling to India next week as well. So, there’s opportunities. There’s a lot to work on with India,” he said.

Rodriquez’s visit has not been officially announced, and officials said that she was supposed to come for the International Big Cat Alliance summit. But the summit has been deferred now because of the Ebola outbreak in Africa.

During the visit, Rubio is likely to attend the 250th year celebrations of American Independence in New Delhi. While his New Delhi visit was known, the addition of Kolkata, Agra and Jaipur are new stops in the itinerary.

The meeting of Quad Foreign Ministers will pave the way for the summit of the grouping’s leaders later this year.

If the summit takes place, it will work towards eliminating the shadow cast on Indo-US ties as well as the future of the Quad ever since US President Donald Trump imposed 50 per cent tariffs on India and prohibitive costs on new H-1B visa applications. The tariffs were removed after the two sides agreed on a trade deal early February this year.