LEAD: EU seeks India's help on Iran's nuclear programme

Feb 10, 2012, 12:16 GMT

New Delhi - The European Union on Friday asked India to use its influence to bring Iran to the negotiating table over its nuclear programme, and Brussels and New Delhi expressed confidence on reaching a free trade deal this year.

'We shared our deep concern on the Iranian nuclear programme,' European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said after the 12th EU-India summit in New Delhi.

'I asked Prime Minister [Manmohan] Singh to use India's leverage towards Iran to help bring Tehran back to the negotiating table,' he said.

Singh said the Iranian nuclear issue should be settled through negotiation.

'There have been problems with the Iran nuclear programme,' he said. 'We sincerely believe that this issue should be resolved by giving maximum scope to diplomacy.'

The EU has placed an embargo on Iranian oil and has frozen accounts of its central bank to try to compel Tehran to give up its atomic programme.

India, which has traditionally had good ties with Tehran, imports 12 per cent of its oil from Iran and is not inclined to participate in the sanctions.

Foreign policy analysts have long suggested that New Delhi could mediate to facilitate talks with the Islamic country, which has maintained its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes.

European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said India and the EU had taken a 'significant step' in negotiations over the trade pact, the 'single biggest trade agreement in the world,' covering 1.7 billion people.

'The contours of the final agreement are emerging,' he said. '... I expect the finalization of these negotiations this autumn.'

India, Asia's third largest economy, and the 27-nation EU have missed several deadlines on the broad-based trade agreement, negotiations on which began in 2007.

The main sticking points on the agreement so far have been the EU's demand for India to cut import duties on cars, wines and spirits. It has also lobbied India to open its accounting, banking and legal services.

New Delhi has been demanding a higher number of professional visas and removal of the EU's labour market test, which requires employers to demonstrate no suitable candidates from within the EU are available before a non-EU resident may be hired.

The EU is India's largest trading partner, accounting for 114 billion dollars in trade in goods and services in 2010. That amount was expected to double by 2015 if the pact is finalized.

But aid groups have expressed concern over intellectual property rules in the trade accord, which they said would harm India's production of generic drugs, sold to millions of patients at reduced prices in poor countries.

'We have watched too many people die in places because the medicines they need are too expensive,' Medecins Sans Frontieres president Unni Karunakara said. 'We cannot allow this trade deal to shut down the pharmacy of the developing world.'

Climate change, energy cooperation and the situation in the Middle East also featured in Friday's day-long summit.

The fragile security situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan as well as initiatives for stepping up counterterrorism cooperation and efforts against piracy in the Gulf of Aden were also discussed.

India and the EU also signed two cooperation agreements on sharing statistics and securing energy supplies by developing renewable energy technologies after Friday's talks.

The European leaders would remain in India over the weekend and are to travel to China for a summit Tuesday.

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