India Rejects Joining World’s Largest Trade Deal Due to China’s Non-Transparent Practices

India has ruled out joining the China-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) as the Chinese communist regime is “non-transparent” and its practices are “completely different from what the democratic world wants.” “India is not going to join the RCEP because neither did it reflect the guiding principles on which ASEAN was started, nor is it in the nation’s interest to do a free trade agreement with China,” India’s Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal told CNBC on Sept. 22. RCEP was initiated by the 10 ASEAN countries, later joined by China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. A free trade deal was signed by the 15 countries in November 2020 and took effect in January 2022. Although it’s the world’s largest free trade agreement by GDP of its members, RCEP is a loose organization and less active, as analysts pointed out....