Amid US tariffs, India denies Navarro’s “strategic freeloader” statement, calling it inaccurate and misleading.

Trump assistant Peter Navarro has been criticizing India‘s purchases of Russian oil and weapons for weeks. On Friday, the Ministry of External Affairs denied the allegations and called them “inaccurate and misleading.” White House trade adviser Navarro has referred to India as the Kremlin’s “oil money laundromat,” charged New Delhi with “strategic freeloading” against Washington, and referred to the war in Ukraine as “Modi’s war.” He had said that if New Delhi “wants to be treated like a strategic partner of the US, it needs to act like one”.

“We have seen the inaccurate and misleading statements made by Mr. Navarro and obviously we reject them,” said Randhir Jaiswal, a spokesperson for the MEA, in response to the remarks. We place great importance on the relationship between the United States and India. A comprehensive worldwide strategic alliance between our two nations is based on our strong people-to-people links, democratic ideals, and common interests. We expect that the relationship will continue to advance on the basis of respect and common interests, and we are still dedicated to the substantive agenda that our two nations have agreed to.

What was said by Peter Navarro?

In an interview with Bloomberg TV, Navarro had said that “the road to peace [in Ukraine] runs at least partly right through New Delhi”, attacking India’s continued purchase of Russian oil. One day later, he wrote on X that Trump was dealing with “this madness” and accused India of “strategic freeloading.”

The post contained excerpts from an essay he penned earlier this month in the Financial Times titled “India’s oil lobby is funding Putin’s war machine — that has to stop.”

“We run a $50-billion trade deficit with India—and they’re using our dollars to buy Russian oil,” Navarro said, relating India’s oil purchases to the US trade deficit. A immediate response would be a 50% tariff, with 25% going toward national security and 25% toward unfair commerce.

Washington had urged India to acquire Russian oil in order to stabilize world prices, New Delhi retorted, emphasizing that its purchases are driven by domestic energy need. During his trip to Moscow last week, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar referred to the levies as “unjustified and unreasonable” and claimed that they were being misrepresented as an oil issue.