Tuesday, March 13, 2007
India, Japan may ink economic pact within one year
New Delhi, Mar 10: India and Japan are likely to sign a comprehensive agreement for enhancing bilateral trade and economic ties within one year, Minister of State for Industry Ashwani Kumar said here.
A comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between India and Japan is under constructive discussion and Japan has committed it would be clinched within a year, he said at a CII seminar.
India, Japan and US will hold their first joint military drill in April in the Pacific off Japan's coast that will focus on maritime security. The week-long drill will focus on maritime security during large-scale natural disasters, such as earthquakes and tsunamis, Kyodo News agency reported on Monday. The drill, called by the Pentagon, comes amid rising concerns at the growing military power in the region of China, which announced on Sunday an increase in its defence budget by 17.8 per cent for 2007, the agency said.
In the meantime, China (says) it will execute less people: The Chinese government's judicial department also issued a report calling for an end to the use of torture in police interrogations and a sharp reduction in death penalty. It called for tighter implementation of rules on interrogation and evidence-gathering. Confessions obtained through torture will be inadmissible.
"Where there is a possibility someone should not be executed then without exception the person should not be killed," the report said. China accounts for at least 75 per cent of all the judicial executions in the world.
Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee visited China in 2003. Talks on the border were transferred to a much higher level. A settlement, involving ‘swapping’ claims and some minor face-saving border adjustments, still seems remote, due to the political difficulty of selling such a deal in India. New Delhi diplomats pooh-pooh the notion that Hu’s visit might herald a breakthrough on the border dispute, but an agreement is no longer inconceivable, though these matters are of great importance to India, probably less to China.
Also, the China-India relationship is having an ever-bigger influence on Beijing’s bilateral ties with every other Southasian country. Diplomatic relations between Delhi and Beijing are better than at any time since the war in 1962. Some Indians are rather carried away – they propose the dawn of a new era of partnership and cooperation, an ‘India-China nexus’ that will change the world.
IMO: Let's hope such Indians are right. There are seemingly no insuperable obstacles to such a future, but a lot needs to be done on the land border issues at the very least.
A comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between India and Japan is under constructive discussion and Japan has committed it would be clinched within a year, he said at a CII seminar.
India, Japan and US will hold their first joint military drill in April in the Pacific off Japan's coast that will focus on maritime security. The week-long drill will focus on maritime security during large-scale natural disasters, such as earthquakes and tsunamis, Kyodo News agency reported on Monday. The drill, called by the Pentagon, comes amid rising concerns at the growing military power in the region of China, which announced on Sunday an increase in its defence budget by 17.8 per cent for 2007, the agency said.
In the meantime, China (says) it will execute less people: The Chinese government's judicial department also issued a report calling for an end to the use of torture in police interrogations and a sharp reduction in death penalty. It called for tighter implementation of rules on interrogation and evidence-gathering. Confessions obtained through torture will be inadmissible.
"Where there is a possibility someone should not be executed then without exception the person should not be killed," the report said. China accounts for at least 75 per cent of all the judicial executions in the world.
Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee visited China in 2003. Talks on the border were transferred to a much higher level. A settlement, involving ‘swapping’ claims and some minor face-saving border adjustments, still seems remote, due to the political difficulty of selling such a deal in India. New Delhi diplomats pooh-pooh the notion that Hu’s visit might herald a breakthrough on the border dispute, but an agreement is no longer inconceivable, though these matters are of great importance to India, probably less to China.
Also, the China-India relationship is having an ever-bigger influence on Beijing’s bilateral ties with every other Southasian country. Diplomatic relations between Delhi and Beijing are better than at any time since the war in 1962. Some Indians are rather carried away – they propose the dawn of a new era of partnership and cooperation, an ‘India-China nexus’ that will change the world.
IMO: Let's hope such Indians are right. There are seemingly no insuperable obstacles to such a future, but a lot needs to be done on the land border issues at the very least.
# posted by uv : 7:28 AM
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