Trump says will cut India tariff, trade deal close

US President Donald Trump indicated on Tuesday that his administration could soon reduce the overall 50% tariff rate facing Indian exports, citing substantial reductions in India’s purchases of Russian oil that has been a significant irritant for Washington.

- Shashank Mattoo

“Well, right now, the tariffs are very high on India because of the Russian oil, and they've stopped doing the Russian oil. It’s been reduced very substantially. Yeah, we're going to be bringing the tariffs down,” Trump said at the White House just after attending the swearing-in ceremony of US Ambassador to India, Sergio Gor.

Trump added that India and the US were close to a “fair trade deal.”

“We're making a deal with India, a much different deal than we had in the past. So right now, they don't love me, but they'll love us again. We're getting a fair deal, just a fair trade deal. We had pretty unfair trade deals,” Trump said, adding that a deal was close at hand.

Trump's latest comments come at a time when there has been little information by way of any breakthroughs since late September and the first half of October when officials from both sides held multiple meetings that signalled some headway.

Trump has stated repeatedly that India has committed to reducing purchases of energy from Russia. New Delhi has been careful to neither confirm nor deny these claims, and has instead cited Washington's measures as unfair as it pointed to imports by other countries.

Recently, Trump gave Hungary a one-year breather on sanctions over importing Russian oil and gas.