Rubio says US is ‘very close’ to India trade deal as he meets Jaishankar in Mumbai

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Monday, 19 October, that the United States is close to finalising a trade deal with India. He spoke to reporters in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, a day before he was due to arrive in India.

Rubio said Washington was trying to finalise a deal with India “right now” and was “very close to doing that”. He gave no timeline and did not announce a formal agreement.

Trade deal with India linked to Russian oil and tariffs

Rubio tied the trade talks to wider questions about energy and sanctions. On Friday, 16 October, President Donald Trump invoked Section 115 of the Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act to waive some of its provisions. The waived sections allowed tariffs of up to 100 per cent on imports from the five largest buyers of Russian crude oil or gas, a group that includes India and China.

Rubio said the president wants to use a 60-day period to study what sanctions and tariffs would mean for the global and US economies. He said India had chosen to diversify its energy sources but still buys a large share of its energy from Russia, because changing suppliers quickly is hard. He described India as an important US ally and partner and said every country has a complex set of factors to weigh.

He also pointed to pressure on global energy supplies from conflict involving Iran, the Strait of Hormuz, Houthi attacks on Saudi Arabia and the war in Ukraine.

India’s position and the week ahead

New Delhi did not respond officially to Rubio’s remarks on 19 October. Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said the first phase of the pact has been finalised and is being legally drafted, and on 14 October he described India-US relations as very good despite the delay. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said earlier this month that the talks had reached a plateau and that further concessions could be difficult.

The two countries announced a framework for an interim trade deal in February, but it has not yet been put into effect.

Rubio meets External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in Mumbai on Tuesday, 20 October. MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal has said the talks are expected to cover energy, trade and investment, defence, and critical technologies. Later in the week Rubio is expected to travel to Jamnagar in Gujarat, home to one of the world’s biggest oil refineries.

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