'India and China are bad actors, SCO meeting a farce'; US Treasury Secretary openly criticises India

WASHINGTON: US Treasury Secretary Scott Besant did not pull any punches as he downplayed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Scott Besant accused India and China of being bad actors and fueling the Russian war strategy. Besant, though, kept hope that India could easily solve its existing problems with US.

"The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation was a farce. India is the most populous democracy in the world. Their values ​​are much closer to those of the United States and China than to those of Russia,” said Scott Besant.

Besant also criticised India’s energy trade with Russia. He said that India’s cheap import of crude oil from Russia, refining it and reselling the products, was funding Russia’s war in Ukraine, and criticised Russian President Putin for escalating the attacks despite peace talks.

Scott Besant's accusation came just hours after Trump said that India had promised to reduce tariffs to zero. Trump also made outrageous accusations that the India-US trade relationship was a disaster and one-sided.