US White Home Commerce Advisor Peter Navarro on Sunday (native time) claimed in an interview with CNBC that India was coming to the negotiating desk.
“India is coming to the desk. Prime Minister Narendra Modi despatched out a really conciliatory, good, constructive tweet, and President Trump responded to that. We’ll see how this works,” he mentioned.
Navarro mentioned within the interview that the nations are nonetheless negotiating on the commerce difficulty, and are engaged on ‘commerce obstacles’.
“However as a sensible matter, we all know that on the commerce facet, they’ve the very best tariffs of any main nation. They’ve very excessive non-tariff obstacles. We needed to cope with that, like we’re coping with each different nation that does that,” he mentioned.
Navarro additional highlighted the sudden difficulty the US has with India shopping for Russian oil after 2022, when the Russia-Ukraine warfare began on February 24, 2022.
“And by the way in which, there’s this difficulty of India shopping for Russian oil, which it by no means did. You perceive this. It by no means did that earlier than 2022. I imply, the Indian refiners bought in mattress with the Russian refiners instantly after the invasion, they usually’re making out like bandits. I imply, it is prefer it’s loopy stuff as a result of they make cash off of us in unfair commerce. Okay, so American staff get screwed, proper?” he mentioned.
Navarro then criticised India for its tie-up with Russia and China.
“Then they use that cash to purchase Russian oil, after which the Russians use that to purchase weapons. After which we, as taxpayers, need to pay extra for this, for the defence of Ukraine. And so how can that be? And watching Modi on a stage with China, which has been its long-term existential risk. And Putin, that was an attention-grabbing stretch. I do not suppose he felt comfy doing it,” he mentioned within the interview with CNBC.
In the meantime, Assistant US Commerce Consultant for South and Central Asia Brendan Lynch is arriving in India tonight and can proceed talks on a Bilateral Commerce Settlement with the Indian counterpart, a authorities official mentioned. US-India commerce talks are scheduled to be held on Tuesday, the official added.
India’s chief negotiator and Particular Secretary within the Division of Commerce is Rajesh Agrawal.
Over the previous few months, India and the US have been negotiating for an interim commerce deal. Nonetheless, there have been reservations from the Indian facet on the US demand for opening up the agricultural and dairy sectors. Agriculture and dairy are essential for India, as these two sectors present livelihood alternatives to a good portion of the inhabitants.