India-US Ties: Ex-U.S. Deputy Treasury Secretary Evan A. Feigenbaum blasted Peter Navarro for his describing India as an “oil money laundromat”, potenially ruining 25 years of efforts to build solid bilateral ties with the world’s fastest growing economy.
“These guys have tanked 25 years of painstaking and bipartisan work to build productive U.S.-India relations,” Feigenbaum said in a post following Navarro’s assertion that PM Narendra Modi bears onus for Kremlin’s war activities in Ukraine.
“The road to peace in Ukraine most certainly does not run through New Delhi, and it is quite the deflection to say so,” he said.
Navarro, a senior trade adviser in the US administration, has made statements reflecting Trump’s assertion of India benefitting from Russian crude oil purchases , while it fuels the war machine in Kyiv.
Earlier, Navarro accused India of transforming itself into an “oil money laundromat” for the Kremlin and claimed Indian refiners profit from black-market oil while “Ukrainians die.”
According to Navarro, India’s share of Russian oil imports has risen from under 1 per cent pre-2022 to more than 30 per cent, or over 1.5 million barrels per day. He alleged that Indian refiners are exporting more than 1 million barrels per day in refined products, with profits bolstering Russia’s war chest.
“India now exports over 1 million barrels a day in refined petroleum—more than half the volume of Russian crude it imports,” he wrote.
However, Feigenbaum called him out on making “deeply ahistorical” statements, Further, he signalled that the relationship may be “on hold at best, while suggesting a change in administration could be the solution to bring the partnership “back onto a much more productive track.”
India on multiple ocassions has called out the US administration for singalling it out by levying 50 per cent tariffs, while China, the largest importer of Russian crude oil, remains exempted from additonal tariffs.
