Trump targeted Russia over its oil exports to India and said that Moscow’s economy “is not doing well”. His remarks came days after he dubbed Indian and Russian economies “dead”.
US President Donald Trump on Monday (local time) described his decision to slap 50% tariffs against India for buying Russian oil as a “big blow” for Moscow, while taking a shot at Russia’s economy again, days after dubbing it “dead”.
Trump said that he was “all set to do things far bigger” than targeting Russian oil exports, and claimed that he “got a call” about holding a meeting with President Vladimir Putin.
Trump Criticises Russia Ahead Of Meeting With Putin
His remarks came while speaking with the reporters about his plans to meet Putin on August 15 in Alaska.
“I’m going to meet him…Their (Russia’s) economy is not doing well right now because it’s been very well disturbed by this. It doesn’t help when the President of the United States tells their largest or second-largest oil buyer that we are putting a 50 percent tariff on you if you buy oil from Russia. That was a big blow,” he said.
“I haven’t stopped there. I mean, look, I was all set to do things far bigger than that. But I got a call that they’d like to meet and I’m going to see what they want to meet about,” Trump added.
US-India Tensions
His comments came as tensions with India have been on the rise since his announcement of 25% tariffs on India, and then the subsequent 25% additional duties on Indian exports to the US for New Delhi’s decision to continue buying Russian oil, even though he did not impose any new tariffs on China — which is the largest buyer of oil from Moscow.
India gave a strong reply to Washington, labelling the tariffs “unjustified and unreasonable“, and called out US-EU duplicity over their ties with Russia. The Ministry of External Affairs highlighted that America continues to import uranium hexafluoride from Russia for its nuclear industry.