Speaking at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum, Sergio Gor said, "He has to make a determination in the next I believe 10 or so days." He explained that Trump hasn't imposed sanctions on any country under the law so far and was required to take a decision within 30 days of the law being passed.
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Further, he stated that the legislation gives the President authority to impose sanctions on countries buying Russian oil and gas or helping Moscow evade sanctions. Gor, however, mentioned that the measures were not directed at any particular country.
He wrote, "These sanctions options that the Congress passed, they are not targeted at any individual country. It is three different buckets; one is oil, the second is gas, the third is sanctions evasion. So those individuals are identified based on the numbers. It just happens that India does fall in one of those brackets, along with a lot of other countries."
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When asked if India would get respite or exemptions, the US envoy said that the ball was in Trump's court. He further said that India and the US would conclude a trade deal soon, adding the two countries made substantial progress despite complex negotiations that have been underway for around a year and a half.
"The big picture, the big framework, the big items are done," he said. He added that remaining issues included smaller details and new concerns that could come up as negotiations progressed.
Gor added that the administration revisited parts of the trade agreement after the US Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Trump's sweeping global tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) were unlawful and violated the Constitution byv usurping Congress' exclusive power to tax.
Furthermore, he mentioned that the US was keen to expand business cooperation with India across sectors, including defence, information technology, data centres, and chip manufacturing. He added that investment by American companies in India could support job creation in the US.