New Delhi: India on Friday (February 20) became the tenth signatory to the US’s Pax Silica initiative that is aimed at securing supply chains for advanced technologies and which includes a focus on critical minerals and AI infrastructure.US ambassador to India Sergio Gor, who participated in the signing function on the sidelines of the AI Impact Summit in Delhi, also told reporters regarding Indian purchases of Russian crude that Washington has “seen India diversify” its oil purchases and that “there is an agreement” and a “commitment” on the matter.He also said that the process to lower US tariffs on India to 18% was “making its way through the pipeline” – however later in the day the Supreme Court in D.C. struck down Donald Trump’s ‘reciprocal’ tariffs, which were issued under emergency powers, following which the president announced he would impose a global 10% levy while pursuing his trade agenda through other means.Joint statement on Pax Silica aims for innovation-friendly regulation, private sector rolePax Silica per its website is an initiative meant to “secure global tech supply chains, address AI supply chain opportunities and vulnerabilities, and explore joint investment” as well as to “reduce coercive dependencies”.Silicon and critical mineral supply chains would be a key aspect of the effort, to which Australia, Britain, Greece, Israel, Japan, Qatar, Singapore, South Korea and the UAE are also signatories.New Delhi, which was invited to join the summit last month, formally inked the ‘Pax Silica Declaration’ as well as a ‘bilateral addendum’ to the former on Friday, with Union electronics and IT secretary S. Krishnan, Gor and senior US state department appointee Jacob Helberg signing the documents.Separately, the Indo-US bilateral addendum said that both sides pledge to adopt and normalise innovation-friendly regulatory regimes, plan to support the “supply chains of tomorrow” and seek to create an environment where the private sector can take the lead on AI.India’s joining the initiative comes days after both sides announced a framework for the first tranche of a bilateral trade deal, capping some uncertainty over the pact’s prospects amid tensions wrought by Indian purchases of Russian oil and Washington’s use of tariffs to stop them.While announcing the trade deal earlier this month Trump said Prime Minister Narendra Modi had agreed to stop buying Russian oil and procure instead from the US and perhaps from Venezuela, following which Washington removed its 25% ‘penalty’ tariff on Indian goods that was levied in response to India’s crude purchases.Gor addresses questions on Russian and Venezuelan oil, status of Quad groupingGor, who addressed mediapersons after the Pax Silica signing and was asked about India’s Russian oil purchases, said that the US government has “seen India diversify under oil”. “There is a commitment,” the envoy said.File: US ambassador to India Sergio Gor in New Delhi on January 12, 2026. Photo: PTI/Atul Yadav.“This is not about India. The United States doesn’t want anyone buying Russian oil. The president’s been very clear on this. He wants this war [between Russia and Ukraine] to end. And so anyone who is, in a way, still involved with that conflict is something that the president wants to see come to an end in hopes of peace coming with that,” Gor added.Asked about sales of Venezuelan oil – the export of which the US controls, having ousted former President Nicolas Maduro from Caracas last month – to India, Gor said that the two capitals are in “active negotiations” over the matter.Later on Friday when Gor’s remarks were brought up during its weekly briefing the Indian external affairs ministry pointed reporters to the foreign secretary’s statement from earlier this month, where he did not explicitly say that India had committed to stop buying Russian oil. “Our approach is to maintain multiple sources of supply and diversify them as appropriate to ensure stability,” he had said.Reuters reported on Wednesday that India’s Russian oil purchases – which skyrocketed following Western measures in response to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine – in January reached their lowest share in India’s crude imports pie in over three years.“On Venezuela,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said on Friday, “we had said that if it is commercially viable then we can explore buying oil from Venezuela.”Once the second-biggest market for Venezuelan oil, India’s purchases of the commodity declined after the first Trump government sanctioned it in 2019. Three weeks ago Modi and acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez agreed to expand bilateral relations “in all areas” including energy.When asked about the remaining ‘reciprocal’ 25% tariff on Indian goods and at what point that would go down to 18% as agreed to between the two sides, Gor said this is “making its way through the pipeline” and would occur “very soon”, although his government’s tariff calculus was upset by a Supreme Court ruling hours later.The first tranche of the bilateral trade deal or the ‘interim trade agreement’ too would come “very soon”, said Gor. New Delhi has said that this agreement is expected to be signed next month.Washington’s envoy also addressed the issue of the Quad, whose leaders India was supposed to host last year but which appears to have gone down the White House’s order of priorities after Trump assumed power for a second time.Secretary of state Marco Rubio held a meeting over the grouping “literally minutes after he came into the state department” last year, which “sends a message to the world” regarding the Quad’s importance, Gor said, adding to announce that the US foreign minister “will be traveling to India very soon, in a matter of months” as part of the Quad among other initiatives.