WASHINGTON 

Foreign ministers of the Quad countries -- the US, Australia, India and Japan -- announced the launch of a new initiative Tuesday to secure and diversify global supply chains for critical minerals.

The Quad Critical Minerals Initiative, unveiled following a meeting hosted by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Washington, aims to "strengthen economic security and collective resilience by securing and diversifying critical mineral supply chains," the State Department said in a readout of the meeting.

Rubio met with Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and Japanese Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya as part of the latest Quad Foreign Ministers’ Meeting.

They reaffirmed their “steadfast commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific” and pledged to work together to ensure peace, security and prosperity in the region, said the statement.

In a joint statement after the meeting, the countries expressed concern over the situation in the East China Sea and South China Sea.

"We express our serious concerns regarding dangerous and provocative actions, including interference with offshore resource development, the repeated obstruction of the freedoms of navigation and overflight, and the dangerous maneuvers by military aircraft and coast guard and maritime militia vessels, especially the unsafe use of water cannons and ramming or blocking actions in the South China Sea," they said in the statement.

They also condemned North Korea’s "destabilizing launches" using ballistic missile technology and its continued pursuit of nuclear weapons.

They further condemned the attack on April 22 at the Pahalgam tourist resort in Indian-administered Kashmir that killed 26 people and called for the perpetrators to be brought to justice.