New Delhi, April 15 (IANS) A team of Commerce Ministry officials is scheduled to visit Washington, DC, next week for trade talks with their US counterparts, according to officials.

The talks, being held ahead of US Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s visit to New Delhi next month, will focus on taking forward discussions that have already been held on the interim trade agreement between the two countries, said the official.

Earlier, India and the United States decided to reschedule the official meeting between teams headed by the chief trade negotiators of the two countries slated to take place in the US on February 23, following the US Supreme Court striking down President Donald Trump’s sweeping reciprocal tariff hikes.

The apex court ruled that the executive branch exceeded its constitutional authority by using emergency powers to levy broad import duties.

The proposed visit of the Indian team to Washington to give the final touches to the bilateral trade deal was postponed at the time so that the two countries could study the developments flowing from the US Supreme Court judgment. It was decided at the time to set a new date for the meeting that would be convenient for both sides.

After the setback in the Supreme Court, President Trump raised the global tariffs from 10 per cent to 15 per cent.

India and the US were at an advanced stage in the finalisation of the the first phase of the bilateral trade agreement with the Trump administration agreeing to reduce tariffs on Indian goods to 18 per cent. However, the tariff structure in the US has changed following the Supreme Court ruling.

The meeting is also expected to take up the issue of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), launching last month a Section 301 investigation, which includes India and China among 60 economies in its ambit.

The investigations are aimed at finding out whether acts, policies, and practices of each of these economies related to the failure to impose and effectively enforce a ban on the import of goods produced with forced labour are unreasonable or discriminatory, and burden or restrict US commerce.

–IANS

sps/na