India rejected an Australian request to join maritime exercises along with the U.S. and Japan this June, and Navy Chief Admiral Sunil Lanba said quite plainly last month that there was no plan to “militarise” the Quad.
I took this line from a newspaper. I think the usage of "this June" may be incorrect. It should have been used before the conjunction "along with". Also, the usage of the adverb "quite" is unnecessary. can anyone please explain?
I think either way is perfectly valid1. The possible disadvantage of:
India rejected an Australian request to join maritime exercises this June along with the U.S. and Japan, ...
is that the thrust of the sentence seems to be about the participants of the exercises. Putting this June where you suggest tends to break that up; the original deals with all the participants (actual and requested) before mentioning when the exercises take place.
As for "quite plainly": this is simply a slightly more emphatic version of "plainly". Whether the "quite" is "necessary" or not depends on how strongly the speaker wanted to emphasise their point.
1 The assumption for both versions is that the exercises were to take place in June: if the request had been made in June (for exercises at a later date), it should probably read:
India rejected an Australian request this June to join...
And, as FumbleFingers noted in a comment, if the refusal had been made in June (following a request made earlier) it should probably read:
This June India rejected an Australian request to join...
