EU seeks to boost ties with India as relations with China cool
- Talks on a comprehensive trade agreement have resumed after eight years as the relationship between Brussels and Beijing is becoming increasingly rocky
- The EU’s trade commissioner says the bloc views the relationship with India as ‘one of the most important for the upcoming decade’
The talks, which aim to strengthen economic ties and establish a joint comprehensive trade agreement by the end of 2023, are the latest in a series of efforts by Brussels to upgrade ties with India.
Last week EU trade commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said that “for the European Union, the partnership with India is one of the most important relationships for the upcoming decade”, while Indian Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said the talks represented “a partnership for world trade in the 21st century”.
EU-India trade talks have always proved difficult – they stalled in 2013 over differences on Indian tariffs and EU visa policies for Indian skilled workers – but Garima Mohan, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund’s Asia programme, said the relationship was now “very mature”.
“In the past, one single incident used to take the whole partnership hostage. For example when the Italian marines case happened in 2012 … EU-India summits were suspended for a period of four years,” she said, referring to an incident off the coast of Kerala where two Indian fishermen were shot dead by Italian marines on board an oil tanker.
