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Amidst all the talks of the 10th India-EU summit to accomplish Free Trade Agreement (FTA) as fast as possible, India has made the picture very clear by saying that it would discuss only trade and investment related issues and not the ones like child labor and environmental laws.
Anand Sharma, Commerce and Industry Minister, said “We are clear in our approach. No other extraneous issues will form part of the India-EU FTA negotiations. On the climate change issue, both India and the EU will make their positions at the UN Climate Change summit in Copenhagen later this year”. These words from the minister came during a joint press conference with Baroness Cathrine Ashton, the EU Trade Commissioner and Ewa Bjorling, the Swedish Minister of State for Trade.
Mr. Sharma told that both India and EU were keen on wrapping up the agreement on FTA by the year end of 2010 as was suggested by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh during his summit discussions with Fredrik Reinfeldt, the EU President and Swedish Prime Minister and Jose Manuel Barroso, the European Commission President.
Referring to the recent confiscation of drug shipments by some EU nations, Ms. Ashton added, “we are clear that we have no intention to stop export of generic medicines from India. Officials of the two countries will be meeting soon to sort out the issues this month”.
Mr. Sharma also said that India would not encourage any movement of unskilled labor, as it possesses adequate talent in this field. This point was made as against the issue of visas to amateur laborers from EU nations. Nevertheless, he added there is no issue with the arrival of technical staffs, who join diverse projects that were carried out here.
Venu Srinivasan, Confederation of Indian Industry President, told the day-long India-EU business discussions pressed on the need to give a big push to the trade agreement.
Both India and the EU felt the need to conclude Doha Round. Simultaneously, India urged the EU to allow free movement of people from India to the EU and also introducing a process for carbon credit and carbon funding through launching a Carbon Fund.
Negotiations for an FTA were started by both India and the EU in 2007. However, these could not reach a consensus owing to persisting differences over IPRs and the EU’s negotiating move to combine trade with climate and other external issues including child labor.
The agreement is capable of increasing the bilateral trade twofold from more than $100 billion to $200 billion by 2013. The Hindu
November 7, 2009
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