Industry & Economy
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Foreign Trade
Singapore-India pact: A `win-win' settlement
P.S. Suryanarayana
Singapore
,
June 20
THERE is a perceivable sense of satisfaction, bordering on a sigh of relief, among the trade and industry circles here that the sums of the Singapore-India Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) seem to have been finally done after over two years of negotiations.
The key economic players in various sectors in Singapore are, however, inclined to wait for the fine print of the accord before assessing its likely long-term impact on the bilateral front.
At the political level, plans are under way for the Prime Minister, Mr Lee Hsien Loong, to travel to India next week for the signing ceremony and talks on wide-ranging issues, according to diplomatic sources.
Other sources indicate that tough negotiations regarding some sectors like banking and "open skies" might have accounted for the time-consuming exercise.
Commenting on the details that were made public in New Delhi following the Indian Cabinet's approval of the CECA text on Monday, the Chairman of the Singapore Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mr Murugiah Rajaram, welcomed the reported decision as a sign of "win-win" settlement.
"Now that the two countries have put the structure in place, it is hoped that the business communities in the two countries will leverage on this (prospective) agreement and increase bilateral trade."
Praising the governments of the two countries and their negotiators for having finally clinched an accord following what were described as "intense" parleys, he said, "It is heartening" that an accord had been reached over "a wide range of activities including trade in goods and services."
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