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By Andrea Shalal

Oct 11 (Reuters) – U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will travel to India next month for the U.S.-India Economic and Financial Partnership Conference, a visit that she said would underscore the importance of democracies working together.

“The United States and India are both extremely important to the world economy, and we must continue to work together on the economic development and cooperation that has made our partnership so strong,” Yellen said Tuesday before a bilateral meeting with India’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.

Yellen’s trip to India, her first as Treasury secretary, comes as the United States and its Western partners hash out a price cap on Russian oil that is aimed at curtailing Russia’s revenues, while keeping its supply in the market.

India has stepped up its purchases of Russian oil after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, at a discount to the market prices, frustrating some Western officials who had hoped to build a broader coalition opposing Moscow.

Yellen said the United States and India both faced “shared headwinds stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war against Ukraine, underscoring the importance of efforts to make both economies more resilient.

She did not mention the oil price cap directly, but said she looked forward to discussing efforts to strengthen supply chains and invest in clean sources of energy, as well as U.S. efforts to keep global oil markets well-supplied.

Sitharaman said she looked forward to welcoming Yellen to New Delhi for the conference on Nov. 11, and hoped to generate specific outcomes for the visit and discuss India’s priorities for its presidency in 2023 of the Group of 20 major economies.

Yellen said India’s assumption of the G20 presidency in December created an opportunity for more concerted global cooperation, and lauded India’s decision to join the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework, an initiative aimed at strengthening trade, environment and economic ties among its partners.

A senior Treasury official said Washington’s goal was not to encourage India to formally join the price cap, but to create a structure for Indian companies to be able to purchase Russian oil at the lowest price possible. (Reporting by Andrea Shalal and Dan Burns; editing by Richard Pullin)