Jaishankar, Antony Blinken hold bilateral talks ahead of ‘2+2’ dialogue

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held talks on Friday morning ahead of the high profile '2+2' ministerial dialogue.Blinken and US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin are in Delhi for the fifth edition of the '2+2' foreign and defence ministerial dialogue which is aimed at taking forward India-US futuristic roadmap for deeper strategic cooperation.The Indian delegation at the talks will be led by Defence Minister Rajnath Singh and Jaishankar.The defence ministry said a number of strategic, defence and technology issues are expected to be discussed at the '2+2' dialogue and the bilateral meeting between Singh and Austin.On Thursday, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said the '2+2' dialogue will enable a high-level review of progress being made in cross-cutting aspects of defence and security cooperation, technology value chain collaborations and people-to-people ties.“The ministers will take the opportunity to progress the futuristic roadmap for the India-US partnership as envisioned by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Joseph Biden, in their discussions in June and September this year,” the MEA said in a statement.It said both sides will also take stock of contemporary regional issues and exchange views about shared priorities for augmenting cooperation in multilateral platforms, and through frameworks such as Quad.