M A I N   N E W S

PM pins hopes on Laos visit
T.R. Ramachandran
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 27
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is specially looking forward to meeting his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao in Laos on the sidelines of the third India-Asean summit early next week.

Dr Manmohan Singh, who is leaving for Vientiane tomorrow on a three-day visit, emphasised that his maiden face-to-face with Mr Wen would strengthen Indo-China relations.

“We have good relations with China and we would like to develop these further,” he observed at Rashtrapati Bhavan here this afternoon after the reinduction of JMM chief Shibu Soren in his Cabinet.

The Chinese have also been highly positive about the Singh-Wen high level interface in Vientiane after the Congress-led UPA government assumed power at the Centre.

It assumes significance as some progress has been achieved on the vexed border problem with China coupled with Mr Wen’s proposed visit to India next year. China does not believe that the border issue is insurmountable as a similar dispute with Russia has been resolved through negotiations.

The Prime Minister is also expected to have other bilateral talks, including one with his Japanese counterpart Junichiro Koizumi.

At the India-Asean summit, a document focussing on “Asean India partnership for peace, progress and shared prosperity” will be adopted encompassing the collective vision of the leaders in the political, economic, commercial, science and technology, IT and other spheres.

New Delhi also wants to kickstart the comprehensive economic cooperation agreement as Indo-Asean ties have become broadbased and diversified.

In another first for India, External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh is already in Vientiane for the Asean Foreign Ministers meeting preparatory to the summit. 

PM’s Laos visit to intensify ties
T.R. Ramachandran
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, November 27
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will leave for Vientiane, Laos, tomorrow to attend the third India-Asean summit. He is scheduled to have a face-to-face with his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao for the first time there.

Even as Beijing is positive about such a high-level meeting with Dr Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the key regional summit, India desires enlarging its engagement with ASEAN in furtherance of its East Asia policy.

The Singh-Wen interface assumes significance amid signals that India and China have made “progress” in resolving the vexed boundary dispute that had impaired bilateral relations for long. Several other bilaterals including one with Japanese Prime Minister are being worked out.

At the Indo-Asean summit, the “Asean-India partnership (20:20) for peace, progress and shared prosperity” will be adopted.

“There is growing evidence of the importance of India for the Asean grouping as is proved by External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh joining his ASEAN colleagues preparatory to the India-Asean summit,” noted a senior official briefing mediapersons about the Prime Minister’s trip to the Lao PDR.

He said trade and economic relations with the Asean grouping was diversifying rapidly for which the Prime Minister himself has set a target of $ 30 billion by 2007. Dr Singh and the leaders of Asean will conclude a partnership document reflecting their collective vision for India and the grouping in the coming decades. New Delhi is also planning a key role for itself in ASEAN’s integration.

Lao PDR has been supportive of India in multilateral fora and at the UN General Assembly recently its leaders clearly reiterated their support for India’s permanent membership of the an expanded UN Security Council.

India has several bilateral projects with Laos including setting up of a speciality neurological hospital, funding transmission lines and developing a Laos-India IT centre which will be inaugurated by Mr Natwar Singh on Sunday. New Delhi has consistently shown its commitment to assisting Lao PDR which is in the Least Developed Country category.

India, ASEAN adopt Partnership Agreement

Vientiane (Laos), November 27
India and ASEAN today adopted a landmark Partnership Agreement which envisages, among other things, a vision to catalyse trade between the two sides to $ 30 billion by 2007.

Meanwhile, Southeast Asian ministers today finalised a free trade pact with China and a host of other accords to be adopted at a leaders’ summit, but touchy topics like the lack of democracy in Myanmar and Islamic unrest in Thailand were swept under the rug. — PTI, AP