‘Don’t give China a pass & burn ties with strong ally India over Russian oil’: Nikki Haley warns Trump
WASHINGTON D.C. : Nikki Haley, Former Governor of South Carolina who ran the 2024 Republican presidential race against Donald Trump, has warned the US President not to jeopardise US-India ties over New Delhi’s oil imports from Russia, saying that penalising an ally with tariffs while sparing adversaries like China sends the wrong signal.
“India should not be buying oil from Russia. But China, an adversary and the number one buyer of Russian and Iranian oil, got a 90-day tariff pause. Don’t give China a pass and burn a relationship with a strong ally like India,” Haley, was also US ambassador to the UN, wrote on X Tuesday, referring to Trump’s threat to impose higher tariffs on India.
Hours after Haley’s comments, Trump, when questioned at the White House about US’ own imports from Russia given his criticism of India for similar trade, said: “I don’t know anything about it. I’d have to check, but we’ll get back to you on that.”
Haley’s remarks come in the wake of Trump Monday threatening to “substantially raise” tariffs on Indian goods, because of India’s trade with Moscow amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.
“They don’t care how many people in Ukraine are being killed by the Russian War Machine,” Trump said on Truth Social. “Because of this, I will be substantially raising the tariff paid by India to the US.”
India has since issued a rare and detailed rebuttal against “unjustified and unreasonable” targeting of its trade policy.
“India has been targeted by the United States and the European Union for importing oil from Russia after the commencement of the Ukraine conflict. In fact, India began importing from Russia because traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the outbreak of the conflict. The United States at that time actively encouraged such imports by India for strengthening global energy market stability,” the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement.
Moreover, the US continues to import uranium hexafluoride for its nuclear industry, palladium for its electric vehicle industry, fertilisers, and chemicals from Russia, it added.
Russia also stepped in, defending India and condemning what it called coercive diplomacy.
“We hear many statements that are in fact threats, attempts to force countries to cut trade relations with Russia,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow. “We do not consider such statements to be legal.”
“We believe sovereign countries must and do have the right to independently choose their trade and economic cooperation partners, as well as determine the forms of such cooperation that align with their own interests,” he said on the tariff threats.
India had taken a similar stand earlier as well. “Our trade decisions are based on market dynamics and national priorities,” MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal had said. “Our ties with any country stand on their merit and should not be viewed through the prism of a third party.”
When asked whether he planned to impose 100 percent tariffs on countries buying Russian energy, including China, Trump at a White House press conference Tuesday said he hadn’t specified a percentage but “we’ll be doing quite a bit of that”.
“We’ll see what happens over the next fairly short period of time.”
Trump also mentioned an upcoming “meeting with Russia” scheduled for Wednesday. “We’re going to see what happens. We’ll make that determination at that time,” he said.