White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles is a\u00a0former co-chair<\/a>\u00a0of Mercury. Mercury Partner Bryan Lanza, who previously served as communications director for President Donald Trump\u2019s transition team, was listed among those working on the account, according to a\u00a0separate<\/a>\u00a0disclosure.\u00a0<\/p>\n India\u2019s Ministry of External Affairs didn\u2019t immediately respond to a request for comment. Mercury didn\u2019t respond to a request sent after business hours in the US.\u00a0<\/p>\n The hiring comes as relations between the US and India have rapidly soured in recent months under Trump. Most recently, ties have frayed over the White House vow to impose 50% tariffs \u2014 set to take effect on Wednesday \u2014 on Indian goods as punishment for New Delhi\u2019s continued purchases of Russian oil.\u00a0<\/p>\n The White House has argued that the oil purchases fund Vladimir Putin\u2019s war on Ukraine, but Indian officials say they stabilize oil markets, adding that Washington had previously approved the purchases. The US is India\u2019s No. 1 trading partner, and New Delhi worries that the tariffs could\u00a0devastate<\/a>\u00a0exporters.<\/p>\n On Saturday, Trump\u00a0nominated<\/a>\u00a0White House official Sergio Gor as ambassador to India, putting forward a close aide to fill a post that has been vacant since he returned to the White House. Indian officials have struggled to engage with the Trump administration in part because major foreign policy roles \u2014 including the ambassador post \u2014 have been empty for so long, Bloomberg News has\u00a0reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cTrump waited over seven months until US-India ties had sunk to a new low to name an ambassador to India,\u201d said Brahma Chellaney, professor emeritus of strategic studies at the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi.<\/p>\n Still, Indian officials have recently stressed that good relations with the US remain a priority despite the tensions. Over the weekend, Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar\u00a0said<\/a>\u00a0the US and India were continuing to negotiate over a sought-after trade deal despite the recent setbacks. As trade talks have stalled, Trump has slammed India as a \u201cdead\u201d economy with \u201cobnoxious\u201d trade barriers.<\/p>\n Mercury has a track record of lobbying on behalf of foreign clients who have come into Washington\u2019s crosshairs. For example, the firm earlier this year\u00a0disclosed<\/a>\u00a0a contract with the Embassy of Denmark, which has opposed Trump\u2019s push to take control of its self-ruling territory of Greenland.\u00a0<\/p>\n Mercury also previously represented several Chinese companies targeted by Trump. In 2018, Mercury\u00a0lobbied<\/a>\u00a0for the US arm of Hangzhou Hikvision Digital Technology Co., targeted by the US over its work on surveillance projects in the Chinese region of Xinjiang. Mercury has also lobbied on behalf of sanctioned Chinese telecom firm ZTE Corp.<\/p>\n
![\"RIGZONE](\"https:\/\/www.rigzone.com\/oil\/Areas\/localimg\/logo02_fullcolor.svg\"){kind=logo}
‘ +