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India-UK delayed trade deal on track_我的网站
A | London, Oct 20 (UNI) A highly-anticipated free-trade agreement between India and Britain appears to have floundered at the last minute as Liz Truss’ government gets tough on immigration but observers say the “common threat perception” of China means both sides have a reason to cling on to the pact.
Questions have also swirled over the deal’s priority, given that Truss’ governing Conservative Party now seems intent on replacing her – just a month after she was elected party leader, the South China Morning Post reported.
An unprecedented 80 per cent of voters have a negative opinion of Truss, according to a latest poll by YouGov, making her the most unpopular leader in the UK’s recent political history.
The pact, hailed as “the biggest of them all” by former UK leader Boris Johnson earlier this year, was expected to be signed by the Hindu festival of Diwali that takes place this weekend, a deadline set by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and asserted repeatedly by both sides.
It had the potential to double trade between India and Britain, the world’s fifth and the sixth-largest economies, from the current $29 billion. British firms, especially car- and whiskey-makers, were set to gain access to a massive consumer market with notoriously high tariffs and tedious entry barriers, the BBC said.
For India, the deal was expected to draw higher investment flows, boost manufacturing and ease immigration rules for its citizens to the UK.
Then last week, British Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch said the government was “no longer working to the Diwali deadline”, but added that the two sides “were close” to a deal and that they were “still working” on it.
Indian media reports have quoted sources from the agency confirming that the deal was unlikely any time soon. Speculation in New Delhi was rife that the deal might be signed only next year, the report said.
A Department for International Trade spokesperson told This Week in Asia that it “won’t sacrifice quality for speed and will only sign when we have a deal that meets both countries’ interests”, a sign that London was no longer keen to match pace with a deadline set by Modi.
Two recent events might have driven some of this change in the momentum.
Soon after taking over as Britain’s Home Secretary, Suella Braverman had “reservations” about a possible FTA with India and “having an open border migration policy with India”, since the “largest group of people who overstay are Indian migrants”.
Braverman also criticised a deal signed by the Johnson government with India on action against visa overstayers, saying it had “not necessarily worked very well”.
For many in New Delhi, this was a sign that the Truss administration was hardening its stance on immigration – an issue critical to India’s interests.
It had promoted easier, relaxed immigration rules for its citizens going to Britain on long-term visas as a key policy, partly as a way to shore up domestic support for the trade deal.
In addition, after violence broke out between Hindus and Muslims in England’s Leicester City last month, Braverman sought to connect it with “uncontrolled immigration” and its “failure” to integrate with local communities – a move viewed as another swipe at Indian immigrants.
Analysts say that for Britain and its former colony India, this is an instance of a clash between their domestic and global politics on two key counts – trade and immigration.
Kira Huju, a London School of Economics Fellow in International Relations, said the separation between domestic and global politics was getting “impossible to sustain”.
“India – as Britain’s most important former colony, now surpassing the UK in its economic might – brings out the subliminal anxiety that underlies the ‘Global Britain’ narrative,” Huju said.
“The increasing normalisation of anti-immigration sentiment inside the Conservative Party is crucial here, too. India will want a more generous visa regime, which an increasingly anti-immigration Conservative Party will be hard-pressed to make.”
Yet, analysts believe that even if the deal is delayed and political instability continues in the UK in the short-term, there still remain many binding factors for the two countries in the medium and long term, the BBC reported.
Shairee Malhotra, Europe Fellow at the New Delhi-based think tank Observer Research Foundation, says that a “common threat perception” of China was an aspect that would drive the two together.
“The Indo-Pacific region is a key area where both are concerned about China’s assertiveness,” she said.
“India is also seeking new defence partnerships for collaboration under its Make in India programme as well as technology transfers, and having the UK participate in its indigenous defence manufacturing industry would give this a huge boost,” she added.
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The two sailors were rescued from life rafts by MT Aisopos, a commercial vessel operating nearby, after an Indian Navy P-8I maritime surveillance aircraft located the rafts during the search-and-rescue mission, the Times of India reported.
The Chinese embassy in India told the Global Times that the rescue operation is still ongoing.
The two Chinese seafarers said the vessel, called Ocean Winner, had developed a list on Friday and sank within eight minutes, forcing the crew to abandon ship, Reuters reported, citing Shyam Jagannathan, director general of India's Maritime Administration.
Jagannathan said the chances of finding survivors generally fall sharply after the first 12 hours, but rescuers were continuing their search.
"All agencies are coordinating closely and actively doing search and rescue efforts," Sarbananda Sonowal, federal minister for India's Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, said in a social media post, according to Reuters.
India has experience and capabilities in maritime rescue operations in the Indian Ocean, and the practice is part of the country's international humanitarian responsibilities. Yet its active efforts to rescue the Chinese crew members could still leave a positive impression among Chinese people and allow the public to feel India's goodwill, which may improve China-India relations, Lin Minwang, deputy director of the Center for South Asian Studies at Fudan University, told the Global Times on Monday.
Having relevant officials continue to follow up on the rescue efforts and convey goodwill could further demonstrate India's willingness to improve ties with China, Lin said.
Ocean Winner, with IMO number 9145530, was a 70,000-deadweight-ton bulk carrier built in 1998. It loaded iron ore at Paradip and departed for Singapore on Thursday with 24 crew members aboard, according to Maritime Executive.
The vessel's Automatic Identification System signal disappeared in the middle of the Bay of Bengal at 4:45 pm GMT on Friday. The crew issued a distress alert at around the same time, the report said.
India has long sought the role of a security provider in the Indian Ocean and a major regional power. When maritime emergencies occur in the region, the Indian Navy and Coast Guard are capable of providing relatively timely assistance, Lin added.
The 22 missing crew members include 18 Chinese nationals, three Myanmar nationals and one Bangladeshi, according to the Indian Coast Guard.
Two Coast Guard vessels were dispatched from Sri Vijaya Puram, formerly known as Port Blair and the capital of India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands, to join the search-and-rescue operation, according to a Coast Guard spokesperson cited by Reuters.
Separately, Maritime Executive noted that iron ore fines can become hazardous when wet, as the cargo may liquefy and suddenly shift to one side while a vessel is rolling. This induces a list, accompanied by free surface effect, with serious adverse impact on stability. From 2007 to 2019, 29 seafarers were killed in casualties involving iron ore cargoes, the outlet reported.
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