European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and her team of commissioners will visit India tomorrow and Friday. This is a way for the EU to send a strong signal of its desire to expand its trade and diplomatic ties at the height of a crisis of confidence between it and Washington, writes BTA, citing AFP.
"In this period of intense geostrategic competition, Europe is synonymous with openness, partnership and an outstretched hand", the EC President said before the visit, welcoming India as one of the EU's most reliable friends and allies. The EC team is expected in India for talks with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government.
All 26 EU commissioners are accompanying von der Leyen on this visit to India, which is unprecedented in its scale and will be the first outside Europe for the new EC, which took office in December.
The visit comes at a time when US President Donald Trump is shaking up transatlantic relations, threatening tariffs on traditional trading partners, criticising EU regulations on tech giants and starting direct talks with Russia over the Ukraine conflict.
The EU is already looking for friends and India, the world's most populous country, is a natural candidate, said Andre Sapir of the Bruegel think tank. in Brussels.
The desire for rapprochement with India is the latest illustration of this broadening of horizons desired by Brussels since the re-election of Donald Trump as president in November.
In recent months, the EU has announced a deeper trade agreement with Mexico, the renewal of negotiations with Malaysia, a new agreement with the South American bloc Mercosur and the first EU-Central Asia summit, which will be held in April in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.
The eurozone has also shown accommodation towards China, which remains a significant strategic challenge for Europe, said James Crabtree of the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank.
Building stronger ties with India - a democracy with growing global influence - offers both the greatest economic opportunities and a greater political interest, the expert added.
Trade will be a priority in the talks in Delhi. The EU is India’s largest trading partner, with trade worth €124 billion in 2023, more than 12 percent of India’s total trade, according to EU data.
This growing Asian market offers key opportunities for sectors ranging from defense to agriculture to automotive and clean energy. But protected by high tariffs, it now accounts for just 2.2 percent of the EU’s trade in goods.
Negotiations for a trade deal were renewed in 2022 and could accelerate given the new US administration’s demonstrated willingness to impose tariffs on everything, a European diplomat says. The case for such a free trade agreement has never been stronger, he added.
In mid-February, Trump and Modi demonstrated their closeness at the White House by agreeing to boost trade between the two countries, which currently has an imbalance to the detriment of the United States. The US president wants to increase military equipment sales to India in particular.
But India is also looking to rekindle its relations with other partners as a safeguard against a once-capricious America, says James Crabtree.
The EC's trip to India follows a visit by British Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds, who is in the country to revive stalled trade talks.
Under the threat of US tariffs, India has returned to the trade table with Britain and the EU, the Indian Express reported yesterday.
Other topics to be discussed during the visit include cooperation in technology and artificial intelligence, in which Europe and India want to play a greater role, as well as issues related to defence and positioning vis-à-vis Moscow. predicts a European diplomat.
Historically close to Russia, its traditional supplier of military equipment, India has resisted Western pressure to distance itself from that country since the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine three years ago.