A third of the global economy will be in recession this year, the IMF chief has said, and warned that 2023 will be "tougher" than last year as the US, EU and China will see their economies slow down. Kristalina Georgieva, the chief of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) made these grim assertions on Sunday during a CBS news programme "Face the Nation." It comes at a time when the ongoing conflict in Ukraine shows no signs of abating after more than 10 months, with spiralling inflation, higher interest rates and the surge in coronavirus infections in China fuelled by the Omicron variant.
The tightening of stock exchange laws in the European Union may affect Indian companies going for overseas listing of their equity and debt issues, as they have to mandatorily stick to one country for all future fund raising activities.
It said it looked forward to the consolidation of the ties through the ongoing composite dialogue 'in an atmosphere free from the menace of terrorism and violence'.
Commerce secretary Sunil Barthwal is set to attend a two-day meeting from October 23 at the World Trade Organization (WTO) headquarters in Geneva, that would focus on finding solutions and giving the 'necessary political push' for at least some crucial global trade issues. Next week's meeting comes ahead of the WTO's 13th ministerial conference (MC13), scheduled in Abu Dhabi in February 2024. It will see participation of senior government officials from all WTO member nations.
Agreeing to resist protectionism in global trade, India and the European Union announced reaching the final stage of a trade and investment opening pact, billed as one of the largest bilateral agreements.
Most of India's oil supplies are expected to stay safe because of the country's good relations with both Russia and Iran. That would take care of over a third of India's supplies.
Come December, India may have to re-evaluate purchases of Russian oil if a price cap on crude oil proposed by the US and the European Union (EU) comes into effect. That impacts nearly a quarter of India's oil purchases that come at a discount, helping limit marketing losses for India's state refiners and enabling New Delhi to manage inflation by freezing pump prices of motor fuels. In September, India imported 1 million barrels a day or 24 per cent of its overall imports from Russia, which became the biggest supplier of oil to India.
In a major blow to China's exports, the European Union has announced that it is cancelling some of the advantages enjoyed by Chinese commodities under the generalised system of preferences (GSP) so that other developing countries can also benefit.
Pakistani teenage activist Malala Yousafzai, who survived a Taliban assassination attempt last year, on Wednesday received the EU's Sakharov human rights prize at a ceremony in Strasbourg.
Underlining the contribution of non-resident Indians, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday said remittances sent to the country by overseas Indians were about $100 billion for the year 2022, an increase of 12 per cent in one year. Speaking at a session during the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) convention in Madhya Pradesh's Indore city, she described NRIs as the "real ambassadors of India" and appealed to them to use made in India products and services as far as possible so that the country's individual brand can be promoted across the globe. Sitharaman also said that after the "China plus one" policy, the world is now talking about the "European Union (EU) plus one" policy.
The proposed India-European Union free trade agreement (FTA), which seeks to liberalise trade in goods and services, could be materialised by this year, EU Ambassador to India Joao Cravinho has said.
Negotiators from the two sides will meet in July either at Brussels or Geneva, additional secretary in the commerce ministry D K Mittal told PTI.
UK and Sweden have asked the European Union to set up bigger and "more political" embassies in India, China and Pakistan to strengthen its relationships with these Asian countries.
Noting India's need to raise power generation capacity to four lakh MW by 2030, President A P J Abdul Kalam on Wednesday sought 'intensive cooperation' with the European Union in the field of energy, including nuclear, to help achieve the goal.
India was on Friday guarded in its reaction to European Union farm ministers' 'historic' accord to reform its disputed Common Agricultural Policy.
Demanding immediate withdrawal of the permission given to a diplomatic delegation from European Union to visit Orissa's riot-hit Kandhamal, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad on Sunday said the trip could trigger fresh tension in the district."The proposed visit of the EU delegation should be cancelled forthwith and the Orissa government must withdraw the permission granted for the purpose," said VHP state secretary Gouri Kumar Rath.
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Trade ministers and diplomats from around 130 countries are participating in the four-day meeting that started on Tuesday.
A senior European Union representative said here on Tuesday that the body would soon change its Customs laws to address the issue of seizures of Indian generic drug shipments while en route for export to other countries.
The Blue Card plan, if passed, would allow suitably qualified people and their families to live and work within the EU. The EU says it needs 20 million skilled workers over the next two decades and is very short of expertise in engineering and computer technology.
In a move, which could impact Indian textiles exporters, European Union is considering modelling its 'Rules of Origin' for imports on the lines of that present in the United States.
The European Parliament in Brussels witnessed acrimonious exchanges between some of the pro-Pakistani members and the rapporteur of the report on Kashmir during the debate on the compromise amendments to the draft report.
While keeping their options open, the United States and European Union have signaled that talks with Iran over its nuclear programme could resume, for the first time in more than a year, after Tehran dropped its pre-conditions to a dialogue.
The UK Hindu organizations are urging the European parliament to adopt the report in its entirety, without making any of the 400 and off amendments sought by the Pakistan government.
European Commission has claimed that its agriculture proposal submitted to the World Trade Organisation is fair and a win-win with sufficient safeguards to protect food security of developing countries including India.
World's costliest rice, Indian basmati, may lose the tariff concession it gets in the European Union if the region's latest draft on new rice import regime is made into a law
Our government shows a benign mask to the world behind which its fangs are bared against its own citizens, observes Aakar Patel.
The European Union on Friday made it clear that India will have to take a 'few steps' like associating with NPT and CTBT before the 25-nation body can decide on cooperating with it in civil nuclear energy.
Ban on US rice by the European Union and Cuba is turning out to be detrimental for the American rice sector as the commodity may found it tough to get buyers now.
With an ambitious target to more than double their bilateral trade to $200 billion in the next four years, India and EU hoped on Friday they can resolve differences and reach a free trade agreement within a year.
