Ajit Doval lands in Moscow amid growing India-US tensions over Russian oil: What’s on the agenda?

India’s National Security Adviser Ajit Doval has arrived in Russia for a key visit aimed at boosting strategic ties between New Delhi and Moscow. While the trip was planned earlier, it has taken on added importance following rising trade tensions between India and the US over New Delhi’s continued imports of Russian oil and defence equipment.

According to Times of India report, Doval will hold closed-door meetings with senior Russian officials to discuss regional stability, counterterrorism cooperation, and energy security.

The visit comes amid US President Donald Trump sharpening the attack on India, warning that he would substantially raise the tariffs on Indian goods for buying “massive amounts” of Russian oil and reselling it for profit. He accused India of financing Russian war machine in Ukraine.

India mounted an unusually sharp counterattack on the US and the European Union for their “unjustified and unreasonable” targeting of New Delhi for its procurement of Russian crude oil.

Firmly rejecting the criticism, India pointed out the double standards in targeting it on the issue and said both the US and the EU are continuing their trade relations with Russia.

Meanwhile, The Economic Times reports that External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar is also expected to visit Russia later this month, highlighting the deepening engagement between the two nations despite growing pressure from Washington.

On Tuesday, Russia defended India’s right to select trade partners, saying sovereign countries have the right to select their partners in trade and economic cooperation based on their interests.

“We believe that sovereign countries must have and do have the right to choose their trade partners, the partners in trade and economic cooperation, on their own and independently determine those modes of trade and economic cooperation that suit the interests of a country in question,” Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists, commenting on the US’ threats regarding India.

Last week, Trump mounted a sharp attack on India and Russia for their close ties and said the two countries can take their “dead economies down together”, a remark which prompted New Delhi to say that India is the world’s fastest-growing major economy.

Trump had earlier announced a 25 per cent tariff on imports of Indian goods along with an unspecified “penalty” for buying “vast majority” of Russian military equipment and crude oil.

Declaring that the US has a massive trade deficit with India, Trump had said that while “India is our friend, we have, over the years, done relatively little business with them because their tariffs are far too high, among the highest in the world, and they have the most strenuous and obnoxious non-monetary Trade Barriers of any country.