Rubio heads to Central Asia while other US officials hit foreign policy hot spots

Separately, Trump met with Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev at the United Nations General Assembly last September.Regional politics aside, ​the trip fits an emerging pattern in which Rubio often visits regions not at the center of the news cycle, while leaving some more ⁠fraught foreign-policy portfolios to other Trump aides, including special envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Vice President JD Vance.Read: Leaders of Russia, China, Iran to attend summit….

He was not present for talks between US and Ukrainian officials in Florida earlier this month, when US officials pressed Ukraine to stop hitting Russian refineries.

Vance, not Rubio, ​represented the US in Pakistan during peace talks with Iran in April.Rubio's previous foreign trip, in early October, took him to Greece, Portugal and Iceland.Trump administration officials have typically rejected any suggestion that cabinet-level officials should focus their travels on geopolitical capitals and hot spots.Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau, for instance, said on X last week that the idea only certain destinations were worthy of visits….

All C5 states, while drawing closer to the US, have deep historical ties with Moscow, and the region has facilitated Russian imports and exports that violate ‌US and ⁠European Union sanctions, Western officials say.In the past, the US has pushed regional states to clamp down on those illicit flows.But Trump struck a deal with Moscow this month to import Russian diesel, a move to lower domestic fuel prices before the….

On Friday, Trump waived all provisions of legislation that would have allowed him to slap massive tariffs on some nations that buy significant amounts of Russian crude or otherwise help Moscow evade sanctions.

Among the nations that could have been affected, experts have said, are India and Kazakhstan.India, which Rubio will visit after ​Uzbekistan, remains the world's No.

2 Russian crude ​importer after China, despite Trump saying in ⁠February that India had agreed to stop buying oil from Russia.Additional questions hang over a potential trade deal with India and an expansion of the Abraham Accords in Central Asia.A US official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, described the trade deal on Friday as "pretty much done," ​raising the possibility that an agreement could be announced during the Rubio….

The Central Asian diplomat said the Trump administration has focused its commercial efforts on expanding access to the area's rare earth mineral resources.The trip to Uzbekistan was largely organized by Sergio Gor, the US ambassador to India, the Central Asian diplomat said.

Gor, ⁠who was ​born in Uzbekistan and is a friend of Rubio, also serves as the US special envoy for South and ​Central Asian affairs.After Uzbekistan, Rubio will visit the Indian cities of Mumbai and Jamnagar to meet with business leaders, including Reliance Industries.

Chairman Mukesh Ambani, who earned the Trump administration's favor earlier in the year by backing a new ​refinery in Texas.

Rubio most recently visited India five months ago.The trip is due to wrap up on Thursday.

Rubio heads to Central Asia while other US officials hit foreign policy hot spots Updated 16 seconds ago US officials portray resource-rich Central Asia worthy of more attention than it received from Trump's predecessors.