Rubio refuses to comment on India protests, calls them ‘domestic political matter’

US secretary of state Marco Rubio on Wednesday refused to comment on the protests in India and the government crackdown, maintaining it is a “domestic political matter” that Indian people have to “decide and navigate”.

Rubio was responding to a question during a media interaction in Mumbai on the protests by the Opposition and students, and the government’s handling of the agitation with a strong arm.

Ahead of his two-city visit to India, six US legislators of the Democratic Party had written an open letter urging Rubio to raise the issue of “wrongful detention and excessive use of force by security forces” during the recent student protests in India and also the Indian embassy’s surveillance of those participating in solidarity protests in the US during his interactions with the Indian leadership.

Asked on Wednesday if he would comment on the protests, Rubio said: “No. It’s a domestic political matter. I mean, I’m not going to get involved in their politics. I mean, they have — this is a democracy. They have elections here, so I’m not going to opine on their domestic political matters.

“We have protests every day in the United States because we’re — I mean, people view protests — I mean, obviously I’m not talking about the riots, like what you’re seeing in Europe, where they’re vandalising and breaking into things and burning down buildings. I’m not talking about that.

“But in many ways, the fact that people are out there expressing themselves — I’m not talking about India; in any country in the world — is the sign that this is a country where there’s political discourse and so forth and differences of opinion…. But we’re not going to comment on internal political matters. That’s for the Indian people to decide and navigate.”