Diplomacy in the Indo-Pacific is becoming tense as India plans an alternative meeting following its 2025 Quad chairmanship term ending without a high-level summit. Sources suggest this move aims to ease political pressures and fill the gap left by the missing leaders' meeting.

A stretch of awkward diplomacy is unfolding in the Indo-Pacific. After India’s 2025 term as the Quad’s rotating chair ended without a leaders’ summit, New Delhi is planning to host a foreign ministers’ meeting that could be framed as a leaders-level discussion, even if the top leaders do not attend, according to two people familiar with the matter. The move is seen as a way to ease India’s ruffled feathers on several counts. “It’s akin to putting lipstick on a pig,” said Sourabh Gupta of the...