‘Confident India-US trade dispute will be fixed soon’, says Jaishankar
Indian and American trade negotiators have been holding talks to resolve a dispute over tariffs and market access for their products.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Tuesday that India and the United States are closing in on a resolution of their trade dispute after several rounds of talks.
“Tougher issues in the past have been resolved. So, I am reasonably confident. We will have a fix on the trade disputes (with the US),” ANI quoted Jaishankar telling the audience at a roundtable event organised by the Atlantic Council, an American think-tank.
He is currently on his maiden trip to Washington as the external affairs minister.
“The Indian economy has grown and the politics of the West has changed. So, the US is thinking beyond just the alliance sector,” the minister said.
On Monday, Jaishankar who met US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, had said that Union commerce minister Piyush Goyal and US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer are discussing the details on how to address some of the trade issues between the two countries.
India and the US have engaged themselves with renewed vigour in recent days during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit when he met President Donald Trump in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meetings.
After the meeting with Modi at the UN, Trump had said that India and the US may soon sign a trade deal.
Trump had earlier complained that tariffs imposed by New Delhi on American products were “no longer acceptable” and had described India as a “tariff king”.
In June, the US had terminated India’s eligibility for a duty-free import scheme for developing countries under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP).
India wants exemption from high duties imposed by the US on certain steel and aluminium products, resumption of export benefits to certain domestic products under the GSP, greater market access for its products from sectors, including agriculture, automobile, auto components and engineering.
India had been the single biggest beneficiary of the GSP programme and had chalked up exports of $5.7 billion of duty-free goods in 2017, according to figures from US Congress.
