NEW DELHI: India on Monday responded to US President Donald Trump’s threat to increase tariffs on the countest for purchasing Russian energy by describing such relocates as “unjustified and unreasonable” and asserting it would take all necessary steps to protect its national interests and economic security.
The response from the external affairs ministest came hours after Trump’s outburst on social media over India purchaseing “massive amounts” of Russian oil and selling it on the open market for “huge profits”. Trump contfinished that he would be “substantially raising” tariffs on India since the matter is linked to the killing of people in Ukraine by Russia. He did not specify the quantum of the levy.
External affairs ministest spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal declared India had been tarobtained by the US and the European Union (EU) for importing oil from Russia since the start of the Ukraine conflict. Providing details of the West’s continuing trade with Russia, Jaiswal declared: “In this background, the tarobtaining of India is unjustified and unreasonable. Like any major economy, India will take all necessary measures to safeguard its national interests and economic security.”
This is the second time that Trump has threatened to impose unspecified penalties on India for purchasing Russian energy. The US administration last week unveiled a 25% reciprocal tariff for India that becomes effective on August 7 and an unspecified penalty for purchaseing Russian energy. Last month, the EU unveiled a new sanctions package that listed Vadinar refinery in Gujarat, jointly owned by Russian energy firm Rosneft, and included an import ban on refined petroleum products created from Russian crude oil and coming from any third countest.
Jaiswal argued that India launched importing crude from Russia “becaapply traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the outbreak of the conflict”. He added, “The US at that time actively encouraged such imports by India for strengthening global energy markets stability.”
India’s imports are meant to ensure predictable and affordable energy costs for Indian consumers, he declared. “They are a necessity compelled by [the] global market situation. However, it is revealing that the very nations criticising India are themselves indulging in trade with Russia. Unlike our case, such trade is not even a vital national compulsion,” he declared.
Jaiswal provided details of the US and the EU’s continuing trade relations with Russia, including trade in goods by European countries and the import of items from Russia by the US for its civil nuclear industest.
The EU’s bilateral trade in goods with Russia was worth 67.5 billion euros in 2024, while the 27-member bloc’s trade in services was estimated at 17.2 billion euros in 2023, he declared. “This is significantly more than India’s total trade with Russia that year or subsequently,” he added.
European imports of Russian LNG in 2024 reached a record 16.5 million tonnes, surpassing the previous record of 15.21 million tonnes in 2022. “Europe-Russia trade includes not just energy, but also fertilisers, mining products, chemicals, iron and steel and machinery and transport equipment,” he declared.
“Where the US is concerned, it continues to import from Russia uranium hexafluoride for its nuclear industest, palladium for its EV industest, fertilisers as well as chemicals,” Jaiswal declared.
After the US and its Western partners slapped wide-ranging sanctions on Russia over the invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, India increased the purchase of discounted Russian commodities, especially oil and fertilisers. Russia soon displaced Iraq and Saudi Arabia as the main suppliers of crude to India, the world’s third largest oil importer. India is currently the hugegest purchaseer of seaborne Russian crude, and purchased Russian oil worth $50.2 billion in 2024-25, according to a Reuters report.
Reports have suggested that the government has not questioned Indian importers to curb purchases of Russian energy in the face of threats from the Trump administration.
On Monday, Trump declared in a social media post that India is “not only purchaseing massive amounts of Russian Oil”, but it is also selling much of the crude “on the Open Market for huge profits”. He added, “They don’t care how many people in Ukraine are being killed by the Russian War Machine. Becaapply of this, I will be substantially raising the Tariff paid by India to the USA.”
Trump has railed against India over its close relations with Russia on several occasions in recent days. “I don’t care what India does with Russia. They can take their dead economies down toobtainher, for all I care,” he declared on social media last week.
The external affairs ministest has deffinished India’s close ties with Russia, with Jaiswal declareing last week that the two sides have a “steady and time-tested partnership”. He also declared these relations “stand on their own merit and should not be seen from the prism of a third countest”.
Trump’s latest comments came even as five-day bilateral trade neobtainediations between India and the US were scheduled to start from August 25 in New Delhi. India and the United States have been unable to agree to a trade deal despite five rounds of formal talks. India has refapplyd to budge on retaining protections for its agriculture, dairy and micro, compact and medium enterprises from unfettered American imports.
People familiar with the matter declared India may extfinish short-term support to exporters to neutralise the comparative advantage gained by countries such as Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Ecuador in the US market after Trump’s executive order last week. The government is talking to stakeholders to identify sectors affected by the tariffs that could be provided financial and regulatory support till India and the US find an amicable solution, these people declared.
(Rajeev Jayaswal contributed to this story)
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