US Extends Olive Branch? Officials To Visit India Next Week To Resume Bilateral Trade Talks Amidst Tariff War

India and the United States (US) are all set to resume the bilateral trade talks as the senior officials from the United States Trade Representative (USTR) will be visiting New Delhi next week, reports Economic Times.

The development comes after Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi met with US President Donald Trump at the G-20 Summit in Japan’s Osaka and agreed for an early meeting of their commerce ministers to sort out the thorny trade issues.

According to the report, assistant USTR Chris Wilson and deputy assistant USTR Brendan Lynch will arrive in New Delhi for trade talks next week.

It should be noted that this would be the first meeting between Indian and US's trade officials since New Delhi implemented increased tariffs on 28 American goods following the US's decision to end the preferential benefits to Indian imports in American mainland last month.

Among the contentious trade issues, the US wants India to lower its high import tariffs on Harley-Davidson motorcycles and other American goods and has also sought wider access to India's dairy and medical devices market.

Washington has also flagged its concerns on India's draft e-commerce policy and data localisation requirements, restrictions on cross-border flow of data, transfer of intellectual property and propriety source code and the preferential treatment for domestic digital products.