New Delhi: Although tensions between the United States and India continue to escalate as Donald Trump's key advisors keep them simmering, all hope is not
lost when it comes to securing a trade deal between the two countries. India's Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said that talks are still on with the US for a bilateral trade agreement (BTA). "Lots happen, lots more to go...With the US, we are in dialogue with them on a BTA," he said here at an industry chamber event on sustainability. The remark follows after Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, in an apparent shift of tone, said, "India's values are much closer to ours and to China's than to Russia's." His remarks came after the annual summit of the SCO took place in the Chinese port city of Tianjin on Sunday and Monday. Also Read: Is Trump Aide Peter Navarro Softening Stance? "I think at the end of the day, India is the most populous democracy in the world. Their values are much closer to ours and to China's than to Russia's." "I think at the end of the day, two great countries (India and the US) will get this solved. But the Indians have not been great actors in terms of buying Russian oil and then reselling it, financing the Russian war effort in Ukraine," he claimed.
In an interview with Fox News, Bessent described the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) as “largely performative,” a remark that came soon after the bloc’s annual summit in Tianjin on Sunday and Monday.
Meanwhile, Trump’s trade advisor Peter Navarro on Tuesday said he had “great respect for Prime Minister Narendra Modi,” but urged New Delhi to side with Washington rather than Moscow.
Addressing reporters today morning, Navarro said: “I have great respect for Modi. I love the Indian people. It was a shame to see Modi, the leader of the biggest democracy in the world, getting in bed with the authoritarian dictators Putin and Xi Jinping.”
“We hope he comes around to seeing that he needs to be with us, Europe and Ukraine not Russia," Navarro added.
India has called the 50% tariffs imposed on it from August 27 “unjustified and unreasonable.” Following the move, the US team deferred its planned visit to New Delhi for the next round of trade talks, earlier scheduled for August 25. Fresh dates for the sixth round are yet to be finalised.
