TIDBITS

EU President to visit in June

By IndianMandarins- 02 May 2016
594

eu-president-to-visit-in-junePresident of the European Parliament Martin Schulz is scheduled to visit India in June as both sides are gearing up to kick-start the stalled negotiations on the India-EU Broad-based Trade and Investment Agreement (BTIA) that started nine years ago. The top issue on Schultz's agenda will be to re-start the BTIA negotiations, thereby paving the way for a formal round of talks, which has been stalled since 2013. The negotiations for an India-EU BTIA began in 2007. Since then there have been 15 rounds of talks without any agreement. The contentious issues that have suspended the talks include tariff elimination in automobiles, auto components, and wines and spirits - which are some of the EU's main demands. According to EU officials, the talks are currently going on at a technical level through back channels. However, no date has been fixed yet for the re-start of a formal round of negotiations. "We cannot allow ourselves to go back to the negotiating table and not be able to bring some real progress. So it is better to keep on preparing on a backstage level so that when we sit in front of each other we have something to deliver," said Daniel Rosario, spokesperson, Trade - Directorate General Communication, European Commission. Rosario also made it clear that while the EU is ready for a new approach to the talks, it will not be ready to begin from the scratch.

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