(AFP) – Marco Rubio leads US foreign policy as diplomacy on Iran goes down to the wire, but he is also making time for cultural attractions as divergent as the Taj Mahal and the Village People. Rubio, who serves as President Donald Trump’s secretary of state and national security advisor, took a day for sightseeing in India on Monday, touring the Taj Mahal, the renowned monument to love.
“It’s one of the wonders of the world,” Rubio said of the imposing mausoleum in Agra. “I think it’s important to show respect to the culture of the countries that you visit.” Rubio travelled to the Taj Mahal with his wife Jeanette, who usually shuns the spotlight. He put his arm gently around her as they posed on a bench that featured the iconic shot of Princess Diana in 1992. Jeanette was not the only person to take pictures with Rubio at the Taj. He also posed with members of the Village People, the disco group originally associated with the camp New York gay underground but whose cultural meaning has been transformed entirely by Trump after he adopted their song “YMCA”.
They flew in to perform Sunday night at a gala party in New Delhi for the 250th anniversary of US independence, where they serenaded Rubio with “Happy Birthday” over a towering four-storey cake. Rubio turns 55 on Thursday. The party was the brainchild of the US ambassador to India, Sergio Gor, a high-octane former aide to Trump, who eagerly joined the Rubios at the Taj Mahal. Crowds were kept 100 metres away, but the Taj Mahal did not go into a full shutdown as it did for Vice President JD Vance. The Rubios, joined by Gor and senior aides, later flew to the desert city of Jaipur, where they took open-windowed jeeps up a ragged road to tour the imposing Amber Fort, the former residence of the Rajput maharajas that stares down on a lake.
Rubio was welcomed at the fort by twirling dancers in red turbans pounding drums, to which he gave a fist of approval. After a brief tour, he was welcomed at his hotel, a converted palace, by assembled elephants, white horses and camels as peacocks fluttered in the garden.
– Wooing India –
The excursion is unusual for Rubio, who in nearly a year and a half on the job has preferred short, business-like trips and rarely done events outside of government meetings. Rubio said he was taking advantage of a one-day break in his schedule before a meeting in New Delhi on Tuesday of the Quad — Australia, India, Japan and the United States. He will also stop in Armenia on Tuesday on his way home.
The hectic pace comes as Rubio comments daily on Iran, predicting chances of an imminent breakthrough. Rubio was not entirely away from Iranian influence at the Taj Mahal, whose domes and four-way charbagh gardens are heavily influenced by Persian architecture. The Taj Mahal was built in the 17th century on orders of Mughal emperor Shah Jahan as a mausoleum for his beloved wife Mumtaz Mahal who died in childbirth.
Rubio is visiting four cities over four days in India as he seeks to revive ties with a country successive US administrations saw as a like-minded partner in a world dominated by China’s rise. Trump has shaken up that approach since returning to office, temporarily imposing high tariffs, warming to both China and India’s historic adversary Pakistan, curbing visas used by Indian professionals, and reposting insulting language about Indian immigrants.
In remarks Sunday by speakerphone to the party, Trump insisted he was on board with the relationship, telling the crowd: “We’ve never been closer to India, and India can count on me 100 percent.”
– Shaun TANDON
© 2024 AFP
