New Delhi, May 26 -- US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Tuesday underscored the economic and strategic significance of the Quad grouping, describing it as a coalition of major democracies committed to shared interests across the Indo-Pacific.

Addressing a press joint statement, Rubio said, "The stage today represented countries that collectively are about a third of the world's GDP, over almost 2 billion people, and not these aren't just countries that have economic reach, a third of the world's being 2 billion people, they are countries who share strong values, strong vibrant democracies, who also are committed to many of the same concepts with regards to economic development and have many aligned interests in those fields as well." ...