WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump plans to inform trading partners of unilateral US tariff rates in the coming weeks, as a July deadline approaches for steeper levies to kick in on dozens of economies.

“We’re going to be sending letters out in about a week and a half, two weeks, to countries telling them what the deal is,” Trump told reporters late Wednesday, at the Kennedy Center in Washington where he was attending a theatre performance.

In April, Trump imposed a blanket 10 percent tariff on most US trading partners and unveiled higher individual rates on dozens of economies including India and the European Union — although he swiftly paused the elevated rates.

While negotiations have been ongoing, the pause on those higher duties is due to expire on July 9.

So far, Washington has only announced a trade deal with the UK, alongside a temporary tariff de-escalation together after recent fighting, saying he can “solve anything.”

US diplomacy last month helped bring a ceasefire that ended four days of fighting between the nuclear-armed adversaries triggered by an attack on civilians in the Indian part of divided Kashmir.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in announcing the ceasefire that the two nations had agreed to “start talks on a broad set of issues at a neutral site.”

The statement was welcomed by Pakistan, which has long sought an international role over Kashmir, but India — which has a warm relationship with the United States — was more circumspect.

Asked whether there remained plans for talks between India and Pakistan a month after the ceasefire, Trump said: “We’re going to get those two getting together, you know?”

“I told them, India and Pakistan — they have a longtime rivalry over Kashmir — I said, I can solve anything. I’ll be your arbitrator,” he told reporters.

India refuses any outside mediation on Kashmir, the scenic Himalayan region which has a Muslim majority but a sizable Hindu minority.

“Any India-Pakistan engagement has to be bilateral,” Indian foreign ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal told reporters on May 29.

“At the same time we are clear that talks and terror don’t go together.”

Gunmen on April 22 massacred 26 tourists in Kashmir, most singled out as Hindus, in the deadliest attack on civilians in decades in the region which has seen a long-running insurgency.—AFP