US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he never specified the exact rate of tariffs he would impose on countries doing business with Russia.
US President Donald Trump responded to a question on tariffs for countries buying Russian energy(Bloomberg)
“I never said a percentage, but we’ll be doing quite a bit of that. We’ll see what happens over the next fairly short period of time. But we will see what happens…”, Trump said during a press conference.
This comes just days after he targeted India for buying oil and arms from Russia, and for being the country’s “largest buyer of energy”. He has imposed 25% tariffs on India and threatened more.
On Tuesday, though, he said that there’s a meeting scheduled with Russian officials on Wednesday, following which a decision on secondary sanctions would be made.
The Republican leader was responding specifically to a question on whether he would come through on his threat to impose “100% tariffs” on countries buying Russian energy. These countries include India and China.
US special envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to travel to Russia for meetings this week with officials there.
Last month, Trump had threatened 100 per cent tariffs on Russia, and “secondary tariffs” on countries buying oil from the country if Moscow did not agree to a peace agreement with Ukraine in 50 days.
“We’re very, very unhappy with them. And we’re going to be doing very severe tariffs if we don’t have a deal in 50 days. Tariffs at about 100 per cent, you’d call them secondary tariffs,” Trump had said.
Weeks later and just days before his August 1 reciprocal tariffs deadline, Trump announced 25 per cent tariffs on Indian imports, threatening penalties for doing business with Russia. However, there was no clarification on what the penalties would be.
On India citing US trade with Russia
New Delhi has cited the United States’ trade with Moscow — significant imports like uranium hexafluoride, fertilisers and chemicals — and said the US and EU were unfair in targeting India over its oil imports from Russia.
When asked about India’s argument during the same press conference, Trump said, “I don’t know anything about it, I’d have to check, but we’ll get back to you on that.”
Even as Trump’s tariff threats loom, India and Russia have reaffirmed their commitment to boost bilateral defence cooperation. The development came during a meeting between Indian Ambassador Vinay Kumar and Russia’s Deputy Defence Minister Colonel-General Alexander Fomin, reported news agency PTI.
“During the conversation, the two sides discussed in detail the pertinent issues of bilateral interaction in the sphere of defence and confirmed their intent toward the further strengthening of relevant cooperation in the spirit of particularly privileged strategic partnership,” a statement by the Russian Ministry of Defence read.
After Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on India, New Delhi released a statement backing its energy trade with Russia. India argued that it began importing from Russia because traditional supplies were diverted to Europe after the Russia-Ukraine conflict began.
“The United States at that time actively encouraged such imports by India for strengthening global energy markets stability,” the foreign ministry said.
India is a key energy partner for Russia, becoming the buyer of oil worth $50.2 billion in 2024-25, according to Reuters report.