India Invited To G7 Meeting On Critical Minerals: US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent

India has been invited to attend a meeting of finance ministers from the Group of Seven (G7)  major advanced economies to addressconcerns and future possibilities linked to critical minerals.

The meeting is scheduled to take place at Washington on Monday, January 12, however, the US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he was unsure if the south Asian nation has accepted this invitation.

India was also invited to attend the meeting, Bessent told Reuters in an interview after touring the Minneapolis-area engineering lab of RV and boat maker Winnebago Industries.

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Bessent said he had been pressing for a separate meeting on the issue since last summer's summit of G7 leaders, and finance ministers had already held a virtual meeting in December.

In the previous year, it was established that China dominated the sphere of critical minerals supply chain, accounting for 90% of world's rare earths and permanent magnet refining capacity.

These minerals are critical to defence technologies, semiconductors, renewable energy components, batteries and refining processes.

Meanwhile, western nations seek to reduce their dependence on China's critical minerals in recent years, even as China moved to impose strict export controls on rare earths in 2025.

The meeting on Monday comes days after reports that China had begun restricting exports to Japanese companies of rare earths and powerful magnets containing them, as well as banning exports of dual-use items to the Japanese military, as per a Reuters report.