India\u2019s External Affairs Minister\u00a0S Jaishankar held talks in Washington, DC, with US Secretary of State\u00a0Marco Rubio\u00a0as New Delhi faces mounting domestic pressure to publish full details of a newly announced India-US trade agreement.<\/p>\n
According to a US readout cited by Indian media, the two sides \u201cwelcomed the trade deal\u201d agreed by Donald Trump and Narendra Modi earlier this week, and discussed steps to formalise cooperation on \u201ccritical minerals,\u201d which include materials used in supply chains for technologies such as batteries and clean energy systems.<\/p>\n
Read:\u00a0Kremlin says no confirmation from India on halting Russian oil purchases<\/p>\n
The meeting took place ahead of a US-hosted critical minerals ministerial, with discussions also covering trade, energy, defence, nuclear and the Indo-Pacific, Jaishankar said in a social media post.<\/p>\n
According to the meeting summary shared by State Department principal deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott, Rubio and Jaishankar \u201cwelcomed the trade deal reached between President Trump and Prime Minister Modi.”<\/p>\n
The two leaders discussed working together to \u201cunlock new economic opportunities and advance our shared energy security goals\u201d, and also \u201cexpressed their commitment to expanding bilateral and multilateral cooperation through the Quad,” acknowledging that “a prosperous Indo-Pacific region remains vital to advancing our shared interests\u201d, according to Pigott.<\/p>\n
The trade deal<\/p>\n
The broad outlines announced so far suggest the US will cut tariffs on Indian goods to 18%, down from a higher rate of 25%, while India would lower barriers for a range of American exports and increase purchases of US goods, including energy.<\/p>\n
Read more:\u00a0Indian opposition hits Modi over US-India trade deal, demands full details<\/p>\n
But opposition leaders in India say the government has not published a full text, timelines or an enforcement mechanism, and they want Parliament briefed before the deal is implemented.<\/p>\n
India\u2019s main opposition party, the Indian National Congress, said the government must take \u201cthe Parliament and the entire country into confidence and share all the details,\u201d warning the deal could expose the domestic industry and farmers to fresh competition.<\/p>\n
US officials have framed the agreement as a boost for American exports, particularly farm products, while\u00a0Reuters\u00a0reporting has suggested India may retain protections for some politically sensitive agricultural sectors.<\/p>\n
US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said India would maintain some protections in “key areas” of its politically important farm sector, but the United States would continue to work for access.<\/p>\n
Overall, Greer said India’s tariff reductions on nuts, fruits and vegetables, and on access to wine and spirits amounted to a “big win” for US farmers, opening a market of more than a billion people to more US goods. He did not mention any new US access to India’s markets for rice, beef, soybeans, sugar or dairy, which are highly guarded commodities that India excluded from its recent trade deal with the European Union.<\/p>\n
An Indian government official told\u00a0Reuters\u00a0on Tuesday that India would gradually ramp up purchases of US petroleum, aircraft, defence, telecom goods and pharmaceuticals as part of the deal, which includes a multi-year commitment to buy $500 billion in American goods.<\/p>\n
For Washington, critical minerals have become a strategic priority as countries seek to reduce dependence on single-source supply chains.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
India\u2019s External Affairs Minister\u00a0S Jaishankar held talks in Washington, DC, with US Secretary of State\u00a0Marco Rubio\u00a0as New Delhi faces mounting domestic pressure to publish full details of a newly announced India-US trade agreement. According to a US readout cited by Indian media, the two sides \u201cwelcomed the trade deal\u201d agreed by Donald Trump and Narendra …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1846"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1850,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1846\/revisions\/1850"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}