‘AI will have a huge impact on jobs in India’: Luxembourg Deputy PM
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In November 2020, the then Prime Minister of Luxembourg, Xavier Bettel, held the first virtual summit with Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now, as Deputy PM and Foreign Minister, Bettel, who is on a three-day official visit to India, held talks with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Monday. After the talks, Jaishankar said “trusted partnerships” between India and Luxembourg have assumed “great relevance in times of global uncertainties and disruptions.”
In an exclusive interview, Bettel, who was the PM of Luxembourg between 2013 and 2023, discussed bilateral ties in fintech, AI, tariff wars, immigration and the Russia-Ukraine conflict ahead of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to India for the BRICS summit. Edited excerpts:
On how the relationship has changed since the 2020 virtual summit: Bettel recalled that a Luxembourgish company involved in cooling vaccines had faced difficulty opening a factory in India, but Modi told him “I will do this” and it was fixed within 24 hours. “I love Indian efficiency.” Since then, he said, the two sides have deepened cooperation on logistics and finance, and strengthened education ties, with hundreds of Indian students at Luxembourg’s universities.
On areas of cooperation with Jaishankar: AI, logistics, finance, satellites and space. “We have a big Indian community in Luxembourg, we love them.”
On the India-EU FTA: Bettel said the FTA is now “the framework” and elements must be put into it. He wants to bring Indian and Luxembourgish companies together to explore new opportunities, such as Indian payments companies seeking European licences.
On tariff wars: “I think tariff wars, at the end of the day, are a lose-lose situation. There is no winner because someone needs to pay the tariff, and so you just make it more expensive for the consumer… it’s in fact the middle class consumer who pays the price. Rich people don’t care if it costs 2, 3, or 10 per cent more… It’s the middle class and less fortunate people who pay the price of commercial wars; we destroy jobs, we destroy economies.” He said he would prefer that the World Trade Organization again be able to have dialogue and constructive work.
On what India should tell Putin about the Ukraine war: “That we won’t rewrite history. So there is one aggressor that is Russia, that is a fact.” He said he is happy India’s PM and Foreign Minister visited both Moscow and Kyiv, since “mostly people visit one, not both, and we need someone to talk to them.” He added: “I hope someone will be able to tell him that it is easier to start the war, than to finish the war. That’s leadership.”
On India’s purchase of Russian energy: Bettel said he doesn’t know the current figures but “we should avoid financing the defence industry and letting money come in.” He preferred alternatives to Russian energy “as long as this war is on,” but noted Russia and Europe share history and his own grandmother was Russian. “A lot has been destroyed, and it will take time to build it again.”
On the immigration debate and AfD’s win in Germany: “Our continent was built with migration… We need migration, but we need regulated migration.” He argued that parties like the AfD gain strength from a “subjective feeling of insecurity.” He rejected blaming voters, saying: “Instead of complaining and blaming them, to find answers to their questions… The difference between me and the populist is that I often have the most complicated answer to the easiest question, and the populist has the easiest answer to the most complicated question.”
On fintech and AI: Bettel stressed the importance of trust in finance, and cautioned that “AI will have a huge impact on jobs too in India. A huge, huge impact.” He said it is important to be ready for the AI revolution and to have a legal framework, warning against the influence of AI-generated fake videos and misinformation. “Human contact is still the basis of trust and relations. We should not forget that.”
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