India's stand at WTO upsets US

India refused to support Trade Facilitation Agreement( TFA) at the World Trade Organisation(WTO) saying it would not do so unless negotiations were hastened on a parallel deal to give India and other developing nations more leeway to continue with programmes providing farm subsidies and stockpiling food for distribution among poor.

India’s stance effectively blocked the TFA for now, as the deadline for the WTO to get it approved by all its 160 members and to bring it to effect passed on Thursday July 31,2014

US Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday Aug 01,2014 told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that New Delhi’s refusal to support a global deal for overhaul of custom rules sent out a “confusing signal”.

According to a senior official of the US State Department, Kerry told Modi that India’s decision to block the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) at the WTO “undermined” the message that the new prime minister was trying to send out about liberal economic policies of his government.