Europe threatens to break off India free-trade talks

[pampango]

Source: Agence France Presse

European governments are threatening to break off negotiations with India on a free-trade deal the EU had hoped would be worth 175 billion euros a year, an EU report revealed on Tuesday.

Four years after talks began with New Delhi, frustrated European Union trade ministers have taken the decision to signal a fixed deadline for the deal of February 2012, at an already delayed bilateral summit.

An EU official confirmed the drastic threat, and said that of the 27 EU states, only Denmark spoke out against the high-risk strategy during the talks on Monday.

Thirteen rounds of talks have been held since India and the EU started discussing a comprehensive market-opening pact in June 2007 to boost bilateral commerce. The two sides originally hoped to conclude a wide-ranging deal by 2010 that could boost boost bilateral trade to $237 billion (175 billion euros) annually by 2015 from around $92 billion currently.

Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5j5_GHrROsrLiMNsyGHttYzZAQv3w?docId=CNG.4ec18362289b76ca984f309c220adac5.171

[McCamy Taylor]

1. Europe's beef--India makes low cost HIV drugs available to its citizens. Apparently the pharm

companies of Europe that are driving Medicare bankrupt want to make a killing in India, too--even if it means death to the HIV infected.

[elleng]

2. No surprise, unfortunately.

;-(