Indian Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has conveyed that New Delhi will continue to buy Iranian oil to some extent, the official said, Reuters reported.

India has already placed order to buy nine million barrels of Iranian oil next month despite U.S. sanctions against Tehran’s oil sector coming into force from November 4.

Pradhan said on Monday that two Indian companies have placed orders to buy Iranian oil in November

India’s November loading of Iranian oil will be sharply lower than its purchases in the April-September period.

India was discussing its options to buy Iranian oil with all authorities, Pradhan said.

The United States plans to impose new sanctions targeting Iran’s oil sector on November 4.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in India last month that the Trump administration would consider waivers for Iranian oil buyers such as India but they must eventually bring the imports to zero.

The post India working out payment mechanism to purchase Iranian oil appeared first on Iran News Daily.

In the joint statement, India and the U.S. called on Pakistan to ensure that the territory under its control is not used to launch terrorist attacks on other countries, adding that Pakistan should expeditiously bring to justice perpetrators of the Mumbai, Pathankot, Uri, and other cross-border terrorist attacks. Without going into the merits of this statement, the timing is suspect.

U.S., which recently cancelled $300 million military aid to Pakistan, has been chagrined with the growing proximity between Islamabad and Beijing and the new Pakistani government’s hand of friendship towards Iran. Americans are known to unceremoniously dump friends and allies, and the recent developments indicate that the Trump administration has embarked on a mission to dump Pakistan now. Not just that, it seeks to hijack any efforts to improve ties between Pakistan and India.

Reacting sharply to the Indo-U.S. joint statement, Pakistan’s foreign ministry said it takes “strong exception to the unwarranted references” against it in the statement, adding that Pakistan has conveyed its position to the U.S. on the issue. The spokesperson said the ministry is of the view that mentioning of a third country with “unsubstantiated accusations” in a formal document is “inconsistent with the established diplomatic norms”.

The statement has reopened old wounds that have prevented the two South Asian estranged neighbors from demolishing the giant wall of hatred and animosity between them. This regional disintegration, it must be noted, serves the regional policy of the U.S. well. We have seen in Afghanistan how the U.S. imposed a war and forced peoples and nations to fight against each other. The war has entered its 17th year now, and the U.S. war machinery is busy fanning the flames of war.

Since the new government assumed power in Pakistan, Islamabad and New Delhi have shown signs of a thaw, expressing desire to work with each other and resolve the contentious issues, including Kashmir. Pakistan’s new Prime Minister Imran Khan, in his victory speech, asserted that he would take two steps if India took one step. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi sent a letter to Khan, congratulating him on his election. These developments rekindled hopes of a breakthrough in India-Pakistan relations and brought cheer to peaceniks on both sides of the border.

Indian High Commissioner to Pakistan Ajay Bisaria last week said that Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government has opened a political window and India is “filled with cautious hope”. Bisara had met the cricketer-turned-PM earlier this month and presented him a cricket bat signed by the members of present Indian cricket team. It was hailed as a sign of cricket diplomacy, which works when the political diplomacy fails.

Pakistan’s foreign ministry, reacting to Bisara’s statement, said it wants to “utilise the same window and see how we can move forward.” So, it’s apparent both sides have been making indefatigable efforts to break the status quo and make substantial progress on improving their relations.

On Thursday, Pakistan’s foreign ministry said it was ready for talks with India and was awaiting an official response from New Delhi on how to move forward on the issue. “We are ready for talks with India. We have also conveyed our position to the international community. It remains for India to respond,” spokesman Dr Mohammad Faisal said during the weekly media briefing, corroborating reports that Pakistan had approached India for peace talks.

“We are also saying since long that dialogue is the only way forward to settle all outstanding issues between Pakistan and India. We are officially waiting for a response from India on how they want to move forward. We have a consistent position on this,” he asserted, adding that there were few Track-II initiatives with India which were not official.

So, at a time when the two neighboring countries are trying to resurrect the peace process and open a new chapter of bilateral relations, it is important for the policy makers in both New Delhi and Islamabad to understand that there are forces that do not want them to shake hands. U.S. regional policy seeks to create wars and discords, not peace or agreements.

Unlike his predecessor, Prime Minister Imran Khan seems to have realized the futility of Pakistan’s alliance with the U.S. At an event in Rawalpindi a few days ago to mark Pakistan’s Defence Day, he said the country “won’t fight the wars of others” anymore. “I was opposed to the war on terror, I didn’t want Pakistan to get involved in someone else’s war,” Khan said. “I pledge today that Pakistan won’t fight someone else’s war. We stand for our people and we will have a foreign policy that works for the betterment of Pakistanis.”

The BJP government in India, which signed important defense deals with the U.S. during 2+2 dialogue last week, would do well to remember the words of party patriarch Atal Bihari Vajpayee: you can change your friends, but you can’t change your neighbors. Good relations between India and Pakistan are in the best interests of peace and stability in the region, something the hawks in Washington don’t want to see.

The post U.S. is roadblock to peace between India, Pakistan appeared first on Iran News Daily.

According to the Indian agency, the decision has been discussed during a meeting between Prabhu and Iranian Minister of Road and Urban Development Abbas Akhoundi in New Delhi.

“Our discussions were centered on expanding bilateral ties between India and Iran beyond the energy and security sector.” Prabhu tweeted after meeting with Akhoundi.

Prabhu was due to visit Tehran on October 2 to attend the ministerial meeting of the International North South Transport Corridor but apparently the visit has been postponed for some reasons.

India’s decision comes at the time when the U.S. has imposed sanctions on the Persian Gulf country and is also trying to convince India and other countries to cut oil imports from Iran to zero by November 4 or face sanctions.

Iran is India’s third-largest oil supplier after Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The two countries current level of trade stands at $13.8 billion. India exports $2.65 billion worth of goods to Iran, while the imports from the Islamic Republic stand at $11.11 billion.

The post India seeking to double bilateral trade with Iran within 5 years appeared first on Iran News Daily.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis will hold high-level talks with India’s Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on September 6, in what is known as a 2+2 dialogue.
“Definitely we are not going to zero” (purchases), said the official, who has direct knowledge of India’s oil purchase policy and did not wish to be identified.
When asked if more clarity on India’s Iranian oil purchases would emerge after the dialogue, the official said “yes, that is the highest level of meeting we will have with the U.S.”
The United States is pushing all countries to halt oil imports from Iran after President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 deal between Iran and six world powers and ordered a re-imposition of sanctions on Tehran.
India, Iran’s top oil buyer after China, has so far not decided on the size of any cut to Iranian imports and continues to seek a waiver from the United States.
Trump has threatened that anyone trading with Iran will not do business with America.
U.S. sanctions on Iran’s energy sector are set to be re-imposed after a 180-day “wind-down period” ending on November 4.
Several countries that were involved in the 2015 nuclear deal had attempted to lessen the blow of fresh sanctions on Iran, and urged their firms not to pull out.
During the previous round of sanctions, India was one of the few countries that continued to buy Iranian oil, although it had to reduce imports as shipping, insurance and banking channels were choked off due to the European and U.S. sanctions.

The post ‘India will not completely halt Iranian oil imports’ appeared first on Iran News Daily.