New Delhi, February 6
On the insistence of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, India has agreed to delink the support to Russian membership at WTO from the settlement of trade payments by Russia. Both countries today agreed to set up a joint study group (JSG) to finalise a roadmap for increasing the bilateral trade turnover to $10 billion by 2010.
Union Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath earlier assured the visiting Russian Minister for Economic Development and Trade German Gref that India would support its membership at the WTO without linking it with payment issue.
He, however, urged him to intervene for early finalisation and signing of the draft inter-governmental agreement regarding higher offtake of Indian tobacco by Russia through the purchase of cigarettes, tobacco or procuring of cigarettes from a joint venture proposed to be set up in Russia by any Indian company which would procure tobacco from India.
Cooperation in diamond trade between Russia and India also figured in the discussions given the fact that India is the largest processing centre of rough diamonds and Russia is one of the world’s largest producers of rough diamonds.
Later, they signed an Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on cooperation in economic and trade relations. Mr Nath said India was looking forward to Russia’s early accession to the WTO for further cooperation in the multilateral trade forum on the basis of mutual benefit. The finalisation of the protocol marks the completion of bilateral negotiations with the Russian federation in connection with their accession to the WTO. As per the WTO accession procedures, the member seeking accession is required to negotiate bilaterally with each member country of the WTO.
The MoU provides for the setting up of a joint study group (JSG) with a view to examining the feasibility of signing a Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) between India and Russia, besides envisaging increase in bilateral trade turnover to $10 billion by 2010. The JSG is expected to prepare by the end of 2006 a roadmap for achieving a significant increase in mutual trade turnover by diversifying and strengthening bilateral relations in a wide range of areas, particularly trade in goods and services, investment and economic cooperation.
The JSG, to be co-chaired by the Commerce Secretary from the Indian side and his counterpart from the Russian side, is expected to specifically suggest measures to arrest the decline in India’s exports to Russia. Even though bilateral trade is increasing — with growth of 11 per cent in two-way trade in 2004-05 — India’s exports to Russia had been declining over the past few years.
