- Ex-Australian PM Tony Abbott said US President Trump misplaced his hand with India, with hefty tariffs
- Speaking at the NDTV summit, Abbott said the US made a mistake during the Cold War by tilting towards Pakistan
- Abbott pegged US-India ties as fundamental and sees tariffs as a temporary setback
US President Donald Trump misplaced his hand with India by imposing massive tariffs, said former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott. Speaking at the NDTV World Summit, Abbott took aim at growing ties between Washington and Islamabad and stressed that America's fundamental interests lie in a strong friendship with India compared to Pakistan.
"I am a supporter of President Trump, but I think he misplayed his hand with India recently when he imposed those punitive tariffs, particularly given there are other countries that are cheating here, especially China, that didn't get the same kind of treatment," he said.
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He noted that one of the big mistakes that America made during the Cold War was "consistently tilting towards Pakistan, a military dictatorship, as opposed to India, a liberal democracy."
The former Australian PM pointed out that for the last 20 years, the Americans "very sensibly have been trying to rectify that."
"I think this (tariffs) is a serious setback. But given the fundamental community of interest and values that India does have with the democracies, I think it will only be a temporary setback, but let's hope that this can be remedied very quickly," he said.
Trump has imposed a sweeping 50 per cent tariff on a large basket of Indian exports. The tariffs – among the highest in the world – include a 25 per cent penalty for transactions with Russia that are a key source of funds for its war in Ukraine.
Taking a jab at the Trump administration's growing ties with the Shehbaz Sharif government in Pakistan, Abbott said, "America's fundamental interests lie in a strong friendship with India compared to Pakistan. India's fundamental interests lie in a strong partnership with fellow democracies much less than with dictatorships."
He added, "Pakistan cooperated so closely with the US on terrorism that they gave (Osama) Bin Laden a home for the best part of a decade. There are good people in Pakistan, but it is still at heart a military society with a strong Islamist streak. India is totally different. I'm not saying the US should not work with Pakistan where it can. But it needs to know where its better friends are."
