India-ASEAN trade pact signing on schedule

New Delhi, Nov 9 (PTI) Political problems in Thailand are
unlikely to come in the way of India signing a trade-opening
pact with the 10-nation south-east Asian economic bloc during
the India-A.S.E.A.N. summit on December 17.

"If any country is unable to complete its domestic
procedure, it would sign it later. The rest of them will sign
on the scheduled date," a Commerce Ministry official said.

While the deal on the Comprehensive Economic Cooperation
Agreement (C.E.C.A.) was clinched in August, it was left to be
signed at the December 17 summit, which is to be attended by
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Unlike India, where trade agreements do not need
Parliamentary approval, Association of east Asian nation
(ASEAN) member-countries require clearance from their
parliaments for the pact that would open the market for goods
for 1.5 billion people.

Due to the political uncertainty, Thailand is not able to

"Thailand will also move further... if their Parliament
can't approve, before the target date, they will tell us. Most
likely they will sign," the official said.

Prolonged negotiations on the C.E.C.A. were completed in
August. Differences revolved on the level of opening the
politically-sensitive agricultural commodities like tea, palm
oil and pepper.

While C.E.C.A. would initially be restricted to goods,
negotiations on extending its scope to services and investment
would begin in the next phase.

A.S.E.A.N. has emerged as an important economic partner
for India with bilateral trade growing to 38 billion dollar in
2007-08. This is set to grow to 50 billion dollar by 2010.

Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the
Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam make up the
10-nation A.S.E.A.N. -PTI RK
SAK
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