INTERNATIONAL
INDIA- EUROPEAN UNION RELATIONS IN 2005
By Priyanka Kumar
Many a times Europeans have pursued different thought of line as fissures and
disagreement on foreign policies have been voiced among them on important issues
such as Iraq war thereby causing doubts about their common foreign and security
policies. Can Europeans put aside their national interest and speak in one
voice? Despite these apprehensions India responds positively to the overture of
European Union and recognizes it as a potential ‘political player’ in world
affairs. In this respects 2005 was a very fruitful year for European Union-
India relations.
Early this year, the new Trade Commissioner, Mr. Mandelson visited India from
January 12-15. Mr. Mandelson began his visit with an address at CII Partnership
Summit in Kolkata. The trade Commissioner stressed that European Union takes
India seriously and ‘time has come to move from words to action’. He stressed
that investment is the key issue. But despite growing interest by European
companies in India, actual investment levels are rather disappointing. According
to Mr. Mandelson, ‘the joint action plan should mark a new beginning in building
trade and investment links between India and European Union’.
India’s response titled ‘EC: Communication - An EU-India Strategic
Partnership-India Response’, on the other hand, underlines the importance of
India for EU’s Asia policy. It asserts, that ‘Asia has now emerged as the
world’s most populous and fastest growing region. Though the continent does face
a host of problems – burgeoning population, strained natural resources,
environmental pollution and socio-economic disparities, it has become a
powerhouse of economic activity and growth, attracting vast amounts of
investment, industrial relocation and technology transfer. The EU has been
giving due recognition to the importance of this emergent region, and is
increasingly focusing on the continent and individual Asian nations. Its
strengthening ties with China and Japan, its engagement of the ASEAN and its
evolving approach towards India are some of the indicators one can recall
quickly.
The most important event in this respect was the ‘Sixth India-European Union
summit’ held on 7 September 2005 which provided teeth to the ‘European
Union-India strategic partnership’ launched in 2004. The strategic partnership
is conferred by European Union on only five other countries- China, Canada,
Russia, Japan and United States. The summit was attended by European Council
President Tony Blair, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and
European Union High Representative Javier Solana to meet the Indian leadership
led by the Prime Minister, Dr. Manmohan Singh. The European Commissioner for
External Affairs and European Neighbourhood policy Ms. Benita Ferraro Walder and
Trade Commissioner, Mr. Mandelson also participated in the summit.
The summit resulted in adaptation of Joint Action Plan to implement strategic
partnership and joint political declaration in order to deepen relations between
European Union and India. India has always been an ardent supporter of
strengthening its relations with the regional groupings such as SAARC, ASEAN,
Mercosur, GCC, AU and thus European Union is not an exception. The strategic
partnership between European Union and India calls for enhancing co-operation at
international front, increase economic and trade co-operation, fostering
parliamentary, academic and cultural relations and promoting new development
policies.
The European Parliament’s draft resolution on co-operation with India stressed
the need for consolidating the strategic association with India. The joint
political declaration emphasis developing and strengthening linkages between
India and European Union by identifying the core competencies and critical
points of each other and to extend help to absolve diverse complex problems
faced by both. This can be possible only by means of strengthening dialogue and
consultation mechanism both at bilateral and regional level through the forums
of SAARC and European Union. The political dialogue between the two emphasizes
the need to strengthen multilateralism, issues of democracy, human rights,
peacekeeping, peace building and post-conflict assistance, disarmament and
nuclear issue, fight against terrorism and organized crime, bringing people
together and increasing mutual visibility in each other society.
In the field of economic co-operation simplifying market access to European
countries by adopting the new Generalized Preference System was one achievement.
The new GSP will come into effect on first of January 2006. It will give wide
tariffs preferences to additional three hundred products. On 7 September 2005,
European Union- India business forum was organized by Ministry of Commerce and
Indian and European business confederations such as CBI, UNICE, FICCI and CII.
It was attended by the top executives of trade and business on either side and
led to formation of Business Leader Forum for institutionalizing dialogue on
economic and trade relations between the two. On the economic front, EU remains
India’s largest trading and investment partner and total EU-India trade is
around Euro 28 billion. About 30 per cent of India’s exports go to EU. But as a
share of total EU trade, India’s share remains small and India ranks as EU’s
14th trading partner. India also receives only 0.2 per cent of EU’s Foreign
Direct Investment outflows. Services which account for half of India’s GDP are a
mere 0.8 per cent of EU’s total consumption of services.
In the field of development and culture, on 3 May European Union launched its
first international news channel Euronews in India. On 1 September it organized
a cultural meet in collaboration with Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR).
As a part of cultural week it organized a series of films, exhibitions and
musical events Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai from 1-10 October. It could be seen as
an attempt to understand each other. European Union since the beginning of this
year played an important role in development issues such as tsunami disaster
relief measure. The aim of such exercise is primarily to build close interaction
between civil societies and enhance talks thereby compensating for the presence
of Indian diaspora and thick organic linkages between India- Europe. In the
official document titled India‘s response to EC Communication :An EU- India
Strategic Partnership’ while appreciating European Union for these gesture also
proposed that ‘Indian authorities would help identify areas, within the broad
theme of poverty alleviation, where India would like EU participation on an
activity based multi-state spread. It also advised EU to carry out a mid-term
review of its Strategy Paper on India of development aid over the period
2001-2006 to examine whether the funding is proceeding as visualized and
conforms to India’s plan priorities.’
Despite these achievements of European Union- India relationship all is not
smooth especially European Union stand on Kashmir and support Pakistan. There is
also a need for co-ordination on issues of conflict management in West Asia,
anti dumping and anti subsidy action on issues of phyto-sanitary measures and
labour standards. The azo dye certification required for textiles and leather
exports and quality standards requirement for agricultural goods, issues of
trade related intellectual property rights (TRIPS) and trade related investment
measures (TRIMS) and in services (GATS) also require greater co-ordination.
Doubts are also raised on bonding of this strategic partnership when it is
compared to Indo-US strategic partnership.
EU and India relations are also affected by the new synergies which are emerging
in South Asia with the demise of Iraq and Afghan war .The new thaw between India
and Pakistan relations increased speculation about collaborations and alliances
on energy from Central Asia. In fact European Union views the tripartite
agreement between India, Pakistan and Iran as feasible and even advised USA not
to reprimand India rather support the agreement. India with a stable democratic
government, having sixth largest middle class purchasing power parity in the
world, one of the fastest growing economies, with most of the population young,
India holds great potential for Europe in terms of investment, exports and
potential markets. There exists great potentials in the new relationship which
needs to be both explored and exploited for mutual benefits accruing to European
Union and India. This requires enormous efforts from both the side to gradually
strengthen the relations in years to come by casting away colonial legacy of
Europeans in the minds of Indians while Europeans on the other hand needs to
acknowledge India as a land of modernity rather than snake charmers and mystics.
-CNF
(Ms. Priyanka Kumar is a research scholar in the School of International
Studies, J.N.U)