Europe fills diplomatic agenda for India this week
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz begins his first trip to India on Monday, with the aim of gaining a larger market share weeks before the FTA to be signed with the European Union (EU). French diplomatic advisor and G20 Sherpa Emmanuel Bonne will be in the Capital on Monday and Tuesday to prepare the ground for French President Emmanuel Macron’s trip in February.
Immediately after the talks between Germany and France, the visit of Polish foreign minister Radosław Sikorski will come.
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi will meet Merz in Ahmedabad on Monday. The two will review the progress made in the India-Germany strategic partnership, which recently completed 25 years. The talks will also focus on further intensifying cooperation in the fields of trade and investment, technology, education, skills and mobility, as well as advancing cooperation in key areas.
Green Energy, Technology Collaborations
These include defense and security, science, innovation and research, green and sustainable development, and people-to-people relations with Germany. At the top of the agenda will be mobility, trade and investment, science and technology, as well as defense partnership.
The India-EU summit is scheduled to be held on January 27.
There are nearly 300,000 Indian passport holders and people of Indian origin in Germany, including 60,000 students. The Indian diaspora mainly consists of professionals, researchers and scientists, entrepreneurs, nurses and students. There has been a significant increase in the number of qualified Indian IT, banking and finance professionals in this country in the last few years.
Meanwhile, Sikorski’s visit will be the first by a Polish foreign minister after 2022. Visits by Polish ministers to India have been limited in recent years as Warsaw strengthens relations with Pakistan, including as a gateway for the supply of munitions from the Pakistan Ordinance Board to Ukraine.
Modi visited Warsaw in 2024 and met Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. The duo elevated India-Poland relations to ‘strategic partnership’. Their discussions covered a range of issues including trade, investment, science, technology, defence, security, cultural cooperation and people-to-people ties.
Leaders identified opportunities for collaboration in sectors such as food processing, urban infrastructure, water management, electric vehicles, green hydrogen and other renewable energy, artificial intelligence and mining. They also underlined the importance of cultural ties, citing the historical bond between the two countries.
External affairs minister S Jaishankar was in France and Luxembourg recently, seeking to strengthen ties ahead of the India-EU summit and visits by leaders of Germany and France. The minister summoned Macron and held bilateral talks with his counterpart, French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Noël Barrot.
Jaishankar also attended the first India-Weimar Triangle meeting, which was also attended by the foreign ministers of France, Germany and Poland, where he emphasized the importance of deepening India-Europe and India-EU relations.
