'Give the bully an inch, he will take a mile': Chinese envoy slams Trump's 50 pct tariff on India

"Give the bully an inch, he will take a mile," the Chinese envoy to India wrote on X.

He also added a post quoting an excerpt from the talks between Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi and Celso Amorim, the Chief Advisor to Brazilian President Lula.

"Using tariffs as a weapon to suppress other countries violates the UN Charter, undermines WTO rules and is both unpopular and unsustainable," it said.

This comes after Donald Trump on Wednesday announced an extra 25 percent tariff on India as 'penalty' for the continued purchase of Russian crude oil.

He vowed similar actions against other countries that purchase, directly or indirectly, from Russia and fund cash-strapped Vladimir Putin's war on Ukraine.

Trump's latest tax crusader takes total duties on import of Indian goods into the United States to 50 percent - 20 per cent more than the tariff on China and 31 percent more than on Pakistan.

In an executive order signed earlier in the day, Trump wrote, "I find the Government of India is currently, directly or indirectly, importing Russian Federation oil... in my judgement I determine it necessary to impose an ad valorem duty on imports of articles from India..."

The 50 percent tariff hit comes hours after angry comments about India-US trade relations.

"India has not been a good trading partner... we settled on 25 percent... but I think I'm going to raise that substantially over the next 24 hours because they're buying Russian oil," he told a US broadcaster.

That potential change has been underlined by Trump giving Pakistan a big rate cut on Islamabad's tariff is down to 19 percent and signing a new trade deal, including plans to develop Pakistan's oil reserves.

India's response:

In a strongly worded statement, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said targeting India over Russian oil purchase is "extremely unfortunate".

"We have already made clear our position on these issues, including the fact that our imports are based on market factors and done with the overall objective of ensuring the energy security of 1.4 billion people of India. It is therefore extremely unfortunate that the US should choose to impose additional tariffs on India for actions that several other countries are also taking in their own national interest," he said.

"We reiterate that these actions are unfair, unjustified and unreasonable. India will take all actions necessary to protect its national interests," the statement added in no uncertain terms.

Earlier, justifying its shift to Russia for crude, the government had said that while India's imports are "a necessity compelled by the global market situation", the nations criticising it are themselves "indulging in trade with Russia".