PROSPECTS FOR INDIA-EU SECURITY COOPERATION

India and the EU have been engaged with each other since the 1960s with India being one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with the European Economic Community in 1962.

- AMB MANJU SETH

A Cooperation Agreement signed in 1994 took the relationship beyond trade and economic cooperation and the first India-EU summit took place in Lisbon on 28th June 2000. While relations between the EU and India have tended to largely focus on trade and economic issues, both sides realised the need to move beyond trade and economic matters and the Strategic Partnership Agreement was signed in 2004 to enable wide-ranging cooperation including on crucial security-related issues impacting both sides. While there was general convergence on defence and security related issues there was a bit of a lull in the partnership due to new challenges and internal issues faced by both the EU and India and it was only at the 13th India-EU Summit held in March 2016 that both sides endorsed the EU-India Agenda for Action 2020 as a roadmap to guide and strengthen the strategic partnership giving a fillip to the cooperation and the 14th India-EU summit held in October 2017 adopted a joint statement on cooperation in combating Terrorism, the scourge of our times, which knows no borders.