Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India is expected to meet President Trump at the Group of 7 summit on Wednesday, just a week after U.S. attacks on commercial ships left three Indian sailors dead, further straining ties between the countries.<\/p>\n
Mr. Modi may be seeking to stabilize ties, but his task is tough: Any grievances he lodges will be from a country weakened by the Iran war to one that started the conflict and has appeared indifferent to its fallout on India. Already struggling to replace oil supplies after Mr. Trump slapped a punitive tariff<\/a> on India in August for buying Russian oil, India suffered even more restrictions to its supply of crude from the Gulf region, bringing the oil-importing country to the edge of a fuel crisis. A trade deal has remained elusive.<\/p>\n Hopes of recalibrating ties were struck a blow with the deaths of the sailors in the Gulf of Oman.<\/p>\n The anticipated meeting , will be the first face-to-face interaction between the leaders since February 2025, when Mr. Modi traveled to Washington<\/a>, to congratulate Mr. Trump at the start of his second term. Then, there was a mutual display of bonhomie.<\/p>\n In the 16 months since, India has found its proximate ties to the United States upended by an unpredictable and sometimes bellicose Mr. Trump, and his administration\u2019s determination to open India\u2019s markets and enforce immigration policies that disproportionately affect Indian students and workers in the United States. The fusillade of actions detrimental to India\u2019s interests have hurt its economy, wounded its pride and cast doubt on the value of the personal chemistry between the leaders.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is reasonable worry that the convergence between Delhi and Washington of the past 25 years has been through a period of drift and may potentially move toward divergence,\u201d said Atul Keshap, president of the U.S.-India Business Council and a former charg\u00e9 d\u2019affaires at the U.S. Embassy in India. Both governments should focus on working to strengthen common interests, such as the digital economy and nuclear energy, rather than delay a final trade deal because of endless negotiations, he added.<\/p>\n India has been stubborn in negotiating a new trade deal with the United States after Mr. Trump slapped a bevy of tariffs on countries last year, frustrating U.S. officials with long drawn-out discussions. But recent agreements such as a critical minerals deal signed during Secretary of State Marco Rubio\u2019s recent visit to India<\/a>, show some efforts to rebuild ties.<\/p>\n President Trump is expected to sit down with Mr. Modi<\/a> on Wednesday morning, and the trade deal that the two nations have been working on for the past year is expected to come up during the conversation, according to a senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n In February, the two sides finalized a framework for an interim trade agreement that both sides say is core to their relationship, but they are still negotiating terms and it\u2019s unclear if and when a final agreement will be signed. The administration official said the two leaders are unlikely to close the deal at their G7 meeting.<\/p>\n Mr. Trump\u2019s insistence that he mediated a cease-fire between India and Pakistan after the two enemies fought a four-day conflict in May 2025, and Mr. Modi\u2019s repeated refusal to acknowledge it \u2014 or nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize \u2014 has also created friction<\/a>.<\/p>\n Analysts also said it might behoove India to swallow its pride and be more flexible, mainly because it doesn\u2019t yet have the kind of leverage that China or the United States have to reshape the global economy.<\/p>\n \u201cThe relationship with the United States is the most important relationship India has,\u201d said Aparna Pande, a South Asia expert and senior fellow at Hudson Institute, a Washington-based think tank.<\/p>\n Last week, U.S. forces struck<\/a> three commercial tankers in the Gulf of Oman with missiles, killing three Indian seafarers<\/a> while dozens more were rescued. The United States said the tankers had violated its naval blockade of Iran.<\/p>\n The attacks set off a firestorm in India, where people criticized U.S. forces for endangering the lives of the other Indian seafarers aboard the tankers. The Indian government said it lodged \u201ca strong protest\u201d with a top diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Delhi, but opposition parties have accused it of not doing enough.<\/p>\n Rahul Gandhi, leader of both the Congress Party and the opposition in the Parliament\u2019s lower house, attacked Mr. Modi for his silence, calling him an \u201cobedient servant\u201d of Mr. Trump.<\/p>\n Despite the souring relations on trade and geopolitics, the performative theater of the two men \u2014 both strongman-style leaders \u2014 remains. Last week, Mr. Trump congratulated Mr. Modi on becoming India\u2019s longest-serving prime minister. \u201cAnd a Great One he is!\u201d Mr. Trump wrote on Truth Social.<\/p>\n Mr. Modi has often reciprocated, but relations on the back end have been tense. At the G7 summit held in Canada last June, Mr. Modi and Mr. Trump spoke on the phone because the latter left early and declined an invitation by Mr. Trump to return. India is not a member of the G7, but among the countries invited to join.<\/p>\n Erica L. Green contributed reporting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India is expected to meet President Trump at the Group of 7 summit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":269128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[1452,92736,2101,1480,5011,75,84,83,5009,5010,9,24,63,5007,35553,1069,901,1554],"class_list":["post-269127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-manhattan","tag-donald-j","tag-group-of-seven","tag-india","tag-international-relations","tag-international-trade-and-world-market","tag-manhattan","tag-manhattan-headlines","tag-manhattan-news","tag-modi","tag-narendra","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-oil-petroleum-and-gasoline","tag-ships-and-shipping","tag-trump","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-international-relations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}