FTA between India, China ruled out by Kamal Nath

New Delhi, Nov 20: Commerce Minister Kamal Nath today ruled out India's entering into a free trade agreement with China in the near future saying ''an FTA with China is not on the cards for now''.

The Minister told newspersons here that while an FTA with China was ''something worth examining'' instead the country would look at the prospect of ''a comprehensive economic agreement.'' Stating that ''investment is a two-way street'', Mr Kamal Nath said he would be meeting with his Chinese counterpart in this connection during his visit here as part of the high-level delegation accompanying President Hu Jintao.

There were several agreements which would be initialled during the visit of the Chinese delegation, he said but refused to elaborate on the nature of the agreements.

On Chinese investments in India, he said, ''We welcome Chinese investments in India, we are looking at greater Chinese investments.

There are a lot of synergies with the Chinese and we're looking at these.'' India-China trade has seen a huge growth in recent years from 1 billion US dollars four years ago to 20 billion US dollars in recent times.

UNI

Related Stories