India-US: Very excited to ask India to hitch Pax Silica, says high official

The U.S. has mentioned it’s “very excited” to have prolonged an invite to India to hitch the Pax Silica initiative on provide chain safety and will probably be quickly signing with the Indian authorities, underlining there may be “very constructive momentum” in relations with New Delhi.

Highlighting the “nice relationship” between U.S. President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Washington additionally harassed that India might be the one different nation on Earth to have the ability to “rival China” when it comes to the sheer quantity of its human expertise. “We’re very excited to have prolonged an invite for India to hitch” Pax Silica, and “I’ll be travelling to India in only a couple weeks for a serious signing with the Indian authorities,” Underneath Secretary of State for Financial Affairs Jacob Helberg informed reporters on Friday (February 6, 2026).

The U.S. had final yr in December launched ‘Pax Silica’, a strategic initiative to construct a safe, affluent, and innovation pushed silicon provide chain—from crucial minerals and power inputs to superior manufacturing, semiconductors, AI infrastructure, and logistics. The signatories are Australia, Greece, Israel, Japan, Qatar, South Korea, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates and the UK. India was not included within the preliminary group of nations for the Pax Silica initiative. 

Mr. Helberg added that whereas the Pax Silica was launched in December, and by January, the U.S. had “already had a gathering of the minds” round India becoming a member of Pax Silica. “And so we’re very happy on the tempo at which issues have been transferring in a really constructive course with our companions in India,” Mr. Helberg mentioned throughout a briefing organised by the Washington Overseas Press Centre on the Important Minerals Ministerial that the U.S. hosted final week.

 “India can also be residence to a big – very giant mining and processing operations, which clearly holds nice promise to make important contributions to the availability chain ecosystem. And so there’s a number of terrain during which we will companion on with India,” he mentioned.

Mr. Helberg additional identified that exterior of China, “India might be the one different nation on Earth to have the ability to rival China with respect to the breadth and depth of the sheer quantity of younger, technically skilled expertise, human expertise.”  

“We view India very positively, and President Trump has an ideal relationship with [Prime Minister] Narendra Modi,” he added.

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Mr. Helberg additionally mentioned that “we’re very excited and really proud concerning the bilateral commerce deal being concluded with India.” Mr. Helberg’s remark concerning the commerce deal got here simply hours earlier than India and the U.S. issued a joint assertion asserting that the 2 sides have reached a framework for an Interim Settlement relating to reciprocal and mutually useful commerce.  Underneath the settlement, India will get rid of or scale back tariffs on all U.S. industrial items and a variety of U.S. meals and agricultural merchandise, together with dried distillers’ grains, crimson sorghum for animal feed, tree nuts, recent and processed fruit, soybean oil, wine and spirits, and extra merchandise.

Based on the joint assertion, the U.S. will scale back tariffs on Indian items to 18%. U.S. President Donald Trump additionally issued an Government Order eradicating the punitive 25% tariffs imposed on India for its purchases of Russian oil.  Mr. Helberg additional mentioned that India and the US are two very giant international locations, with America by far the world’s largest economic system and India the world’s largest nation demographically and a really younger nation, very fast-growing economic system. “So for us to align on issues, it takes a bit of bit extra work due to the sheer measurement of our international locations,” he mentioned, responding to a query on the function the U.S. envisages for India in Pax Silica and why the nation was not initially included within the initiative.

Throughout the briefing, Mr. Helberg spoke concerning the inaugural Important Minerals Ministerial assembly hosted in Washington on February 4, 2026 by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio. The ministerial introduced collectively 55 delegations to discover methods to diversify and safe world crucial minerals provide chains. Exterior Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar participated within the ministerial and, in his remarks, “underlined challenges of extreme focus and the significance of de-risking provide chains via structured worldwide cooperation.”