India slams NATO chief for claiming Trump's tariff made Modi urgently call Putin

External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said "speculative or careless" remarks that misrepresent Modi's engagements or suggest conversations that never occurred are "unacceptable".

New Delhi: The NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte drew flak from New Delhi on Friday after he claimed that President Donald Trump’s 25% tariff on India’s export to the United States to dissuade the South Asian nation from buying oil from Russia had prompted Prime Minister Narendra Modi to nudge President Vladimir Putin to end his war against Ukraine.

Rutte claimed that Trump’s 25% additional tariff – on top of a 25% levy already imposed – on India as a penalty for continuing to buy crude oil from Russia had prompted Modi to urgently call Putin and ask him about his strategy towards ending the ‘special military operations’ he had launched in Ukraine.

Rutte told CNN on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly that the new US tariffs on India immediately impacted Russia. “That means Delhi is now on the phone with Vladimir Putin in Moscow, and Narendra Modi is asking, ‘Hey, I support you, but could you explain to me your strategy because I have now been hit by these 50% tariffs by the United States?’” he said.

New Delhi on Friday dismissed the NATO secretary general’s statement as “factually incorrect and entirely baseless”. “At no point has Prime Minister Modi spoken with President Putin in the manner suggested. No such conversation has taken place,” Randhir Jaiswal, the spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, told journalists in New Delhi. 

“We expect the leadership of an important institution like NATO to exercise greater responsibility and accuracy in public statements,” the MEA spokesperson said, adding: “Speculative or careless remarks that misrepresent the prime minister’s engagements or suggest conversations that never occurred are unacceptable.”

Trump, on July 30, announced a 25% tariff on India’s exports to the US. He followed it up on August 6 with an additional 25% tariff on the US imports from India, slamming the South Asian nation for continuing to purchase oil from Russia. 

Modi and Putin had a phone call on August 8 and discussed bilateral trade and economic relations. After Putin and Trump met in Alaska on August 15, the prime minister again received a call from the former Soviet Union nation’s president on August 18. 

The leaders of India and Russia had a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation at Tianjin in China on September 1. 

In 2024, the third year of Russia’s ‘special military operations’ in Ukraine, the total imports of fossil fuels from Russia by the European Union nations totalled EUR 21.9 bn, a 6% year-on-year drop in value but merely a 1% year-on-year drop in volumes, according to a report by CREA (Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air). The report also noted that the imports of fossil fuels from Russia by the EU nations surpassed the EUR 18.7 bn of financial aid they sent to Ukraine in 2024.

The three biggest buyers of Russian fossil fuels, China (EUR 78 bn), India (EUR 49 bn), and Turkey (EUR 34 bn), were responsible for 74% of Russia’s total revenues from fossil fuels in the third year of the invasion, according to the CREA. 

“As previously stated, India’s energy imports are meant to ensure predictable and affordable energy costs to the Indian consumer. India will continue taking all necessary measures to safeguard its national interests and economic security,” the MEA spokesperson said in New Delhi on Friday.

This is not the first time New Delhi has reacted to the NATO secretary general’s statement.

After Rutte warned India, Brazil and China against buying energy from Russia in July, New Delhi not only cautioned the West against applying double standards on the issue.