India and European Union to Deepen Strategic Relations & Economic Cooperation

Last Updated on November 3, 2017 by Bharat Saini

India and the European Union (EU) 14th annual Summit was held in New Delhi on Friday 6 October 2017; between Indian Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi, and Mr. Donald Tusk, President of the European Council and Mr. Jean Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission. The summit gave a political impetus to the process for a fair and free trade agreement. It has given the two sides a much clearer political strategy direction as they agreed to deepen both strategic relations and to go ahead with these common goals with a long-term view on global and regional challenges, and a rule-based international order. The second direction was economic cooperation, including trade, investment, climate change, clean energy, urbanization etc. India and EU are important trading partners and the EU will remain India’s largest trading partner even after Brexit. The leader at the summit:

• Reviewed the wide-ranging cooperation under India-EU Strategic Partnership, recognising that India and the EU are natural partners.
• Have expanded India-EU engagement into many new sectors and have agreed to continue efforts to make it more comprehensive and beneficial, based on mutual trust and understanding.
• Reaffirmed commitment to further deepen and strengthen the India-EU Strategic Partnership based on shared principles and values of democracy, freedom, and rule of law and respect for human rights and territorial integrity of States.
• Agreed to strengthen security cooperation and work together against terrorism. And also increase cooperation and coordination in multilateral fora.
• Affirmed commitment to the 2015 Paris Agreement on Clean Energy and Climate Change, while addressing climate change and promoting secure, affordable and sustainable supplies of energy as shared priorities. Reaffirmed commitment to cooperate for reducing the cost of deployment of renewable energy.
• Agreed to strengthen cooperation with European Union in developing Smart Cities and upgrading urban infrastructure in India.
• Reviewed the progress in implementation of the decisions taken at the last Summit, and the Agenda 2020, expressed satisfaction at the progress made towards the roadmap for bilateral cooperation endorsed during the 13th India-EU Summit.
• The 13th EU-India Summit was held in Brussels on 30 March 2016. The EU was also represented by Mr. Donald Tusk, President of the European Council, and Mr. Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission. The Republic of India was represented by Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi.
• The leaders in the 14^th summit have committed to work in a result-oriented and mutually beneficial manner to further strengthen the India-EU Strategic Partnership by deepening their trade cooperation, enhancing investment flows in both directions and broadening dialogue and engagement on global and regional issues, including climate change, as well as migration and the refugee crisis, and resolved to further strengthen their bilateral and multilateral cooperation in these areas.
• Expressed satisfaction on operationalization of India-EU Horizontal Civil Aviation Agreement hoped that this will enhance air connectivity between India and EU and help to foster people-to-people contact.
• Welcomed the Agreement concluded on mobility of young scientists and researchers, as cooperation in Science and Technology and in Research and Innovation is an important aspect of relationship,
• Commended the strong engagement of the European Investment Bank in India in a wide range of key sectors, in particular in the field of climate action and renewable energy and to fund solar-related projects in member countries of the International Solar Alliance.
• Underlined the importance of regular high level contacts to enhance India-EU co-operation and mutual understanding
• Committed to further deepen cooperation in strengthening trade and investment flows.
• This time, leaders also included statement on Pakistan based-terror groups and have mentioned not only entities but specific names of Lakhvi and Dawood Ibrahim, and have agreed to consult each other about the listing of terrorists and designating organisations; while working on establishing direct links between Europol and Indian agencies. It means the security cooperation is becoming more practical, and more operational