Big blow for India's Look East policy as ASEAN suspends FTA talks

New Delhi, July 25 (UNI) India today received a big blow to its Look-East policy when the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) today said it has suspended talks with New Delhi on the Free Trade Agreement, because of differences over the negative list.

A spokeswoman of Malaysia's Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz in Kuala Lumpur said, the talks on the India-ASEAN trade agreement have been halted since India wanted a big negative list of 850 items.

Many of the ASEAN members, on the other hand, were not in favour of any negative list at all.

''We are surprised by the news. It was only on July 21 that the officials of India and ASEAN met in Singapore to resolve the impasse. It was agreed by both the sides to revert within 15 days with specific proposals,'' the official spokesperson of the Commerce Ministry said late tonight.

According to sources, the problem arose because of India's insistence on including agricultural items like palm oil in the negative list. While these items can hurt the Indian interest, for many of the ASEAN nations, any FTA without these goods have no meaning.

The goods on the exclusion list account for some 30 per cent of Southeast Asia's exports to India.

ASEAN groups include Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, Big blow for Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.

India has already signed an FTA with Singapore and was betting on another one with ASEAN, especially in the backdrop of the deadlock in the WTO talks.

India's external engagement has touched about 500 billion dollar, industry estimates suggest.

UNI PC RA RAI2134