Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Aug. 4 used his brief remarks to open the 1st Traditional Music Festival of the BIMSTEC countries to deliver a message to Washington and the EU: In these “complicated and uncertain times,” there is “a collective desire … to see a fair and representative global order, not one dominated by a few.”
BIMSTEC, the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multisectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, is a regional association comprising Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Thailand.
That pointed statement was delivered the same day his ministry officially informed President Donald Trump that India would not bow to his ultimatum to stop buying Russian oil, “or else.” Trump arrogantly responded by threatening today that “over the next 24 hours” he will jack up U.S. tariffs on imports from India “very substantially” over the (already punitive) 25%, if India does not capitulate. This, despite India having offered (so he claims) to lower its tariffs on imported U.S. goods to “zero.”
