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India And EU To Ink Expanded Security And Trade Ties At New Delhi Summit
New Delhi (AFP) Sep 04, 2005 British Prime Minister Tony Blair will sign a blueprint for expanded security and trade ties between India and its largest trading partner, the European Union, at a summit meeting in New Delhi this week, a senior diplomat said. "India and the EU (European Union) will agree and publish the joint action plan that covers a ...wide range of international issues" on energy, strategic partnership, international security and trade, British envoy to India, Michael Arthur, told a press conference ahead of the summit this week. Arthur described the blueprint as a "very major document" which will be signed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Blair, who arrives in New Delhi Tuesday for the annual India-EU summit. Britain currently holds the six-month rotating presidency of the 25-member European Union. Blair will be accompanied by European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and Javier Solana, the high representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy. Britain and India on Wednesday will also sign a separate declaration to deepen bilateral political bonds, Arthur said. "The summit is being held at a time when there is a growing engagement in the relations between India and EU," Arthur said. The European Union is India's largest trading partner accounting for 33 billion dollars worth of commerce in 2004. The EU is also the destination for a quarter of exports from Asia's fourth largest economy, Arthur said. However, the EU representative to India, Francisco da Camara Gomes, said trade between the two sides should grow faster. "We still think there is potential for more," Gomes said. To boost trade, Indian and European business leaders will meet on the sidelines of the political summit in New Delhi and the European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson will hold talks with India's commerce minister Kamal Nath. "You have to create the right environment for investment... There are limitations for joint ventures in some areas... caps on investment," Arthur said. Despite broader trade ties between the European Union and India there was scope for intensifying security ties, said Uday Bhaskar, deputy director of India's Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis, a New Delhi based think tank. "The EU has a very credible economic policy. But it does not yet have have a strategic and security policy ...and is yet to decide how they want to relate to India," he said. During the summit, New Delhi and the European Union will also try to reach an agreement on India's participation in the Galileo Satellite Navigation Project, an EU official said. India expressed its desire to participate in the project during the India-EU summit in 2003 in New Delhi. Galileo is based on a group of 30 satellites and ground stations providing information to users in areas as diverse as mobile phones and air traffic control. It is a collaborative venture of the European Union and the European Space Agency. The system is forecast to come online by 2008 as a rival to the United States-run Global Positioning System. Gomes said the two sides would also discuss India's possible participation in the multinational International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) energy project. "There is a goodwill for the two groups working together," Gomes said. "But ITER is not only of the EU," he said referring to the participation of China, Japan, South Korea, the Russian Federation and United States along with the European Atomic Energy Community in the multi-billion-dollar project. Official say the ITER nuclear fusion project would help move the world toward development of an abundant energy source that would not harm the environment. All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse. Related Links SpaceDaily Search SpaceDaily Subscribe To SpaceDaily Express 
Three ISRO Units Still On U.S. List
Bangalore, India (SPX) Sep 02, 2005Even as the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) expresses relief over the lifting of US curbs on three of its units, three other major units of the space agency remain on America's restricted entities' list.
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