#us-india-relations

#us-india-relations

The trip beginning on Saturday was expected to focus on mending ties between Washington and New Delhi following recent trade frictions, particularly over India's continued purchasing of Russian oil. Other issues, including energy security, were set to be discussed, with India particularly hard-hit by the US-Israeli war in Iran and Tehran's effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

Rubio landed in the eastern Indian city of Kolkata on Saturday, kick-starting his four-day visit to the South Asian nation. This is Rubio's first official trip to India since becoming Washington's top diplomat. Rubio was welcomed by US Ambassador to India Sergio Gor at the city airport. In Kolkata, Rubio visited Mother House, the headquarters of Saint Teresa's Missionaries of Charity. He then departed for the capital New Delhi, where he is expected to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other high-ranking officials, including Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

"safeguard the interests of the Indian consumer in a volatile energy scenario." "Ensuring stable energy prices and secured supplies have been the twin goals of our energy policy," "This includes broad-basing our energy sourcing and diversifying as appropriate to meet market conditions. Where the US is concerned, we have for many years sought to expand our energy procurement,"

For months, Donald Trump has presented himself as the very incarnation of a global peacemaker, touting an ever-changing list of international conflicts that he claims to have settled. Sometimes it has been six, sometimes as many as ten. "I ended seven wars," the President told the U.N. General Assembly last month, "and in all cases they were raging, with countless thousands of people being killed," which was not true but has not stopped Trump from repeating it.

Gor, one of Trump's closest aides who currently serves as the director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office, will oversee frosty relations with New Delhi. Bilateral ties have soured over the planned doubling of US tariffs on goods from India next week. Gor will also serve as a special envoy for South and Central Asian affairs, the US president confirmed.