Modi, Biden pledge to deepen India-U.S. partnership as world leaders descend on Delhi for G20 summit

NEW DELHI — Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and U.S. President Joe Biden pledged Friday to deepen the partnership between their countries in their second bilateral meeting in less than six months, as Delhi prepares to host a meeting among leaders of the Group of 20 leading industrialized and developing countries.

The two leaders met shortly at Modi's official residence after Biden's arrival in Delhi and then issued a 29-point statement that highlighted the depth and breath of their relationship at a time of evolving global alliances — from building resilient strategic technology value chains and linking defense industrial ecosystems, to collaborating on renewable and nuclear energy, climate financing and cancer research.

The two leaders «reaffirmed the importance of the Quad in supporting a free, open, inclusive, and resilient Indo-Pacific» and «expressed their appreciation for the substantial progress underway to implement the ground breaking achievements of Prime Minister Modi's historic June 2023 visit to Washington.» The Quad is an informal security alignment of Australia, India, Japan and the U.S., which came about in response to China's rising strength in the Indo-Pacific region.

This closed-door meeting with Biden was the third — after meetings with leaders from Mauritius and Bangladesh — that Modi convened on the eve of the G20 leaders' summit and part of the dozen or so bilateral meetings planned for this weekend, underscoring India's strategic ambitions as a key global player connecting the developed world and the Global South.

The summit is an important one for Modi, whose government has turned the normally sedate rotating G20 presidency into a branding vehicle to burnish India's geopolitical importance