EU-India Summit – leaders agree on a joint statement [updated on 31/03/2016 at 12:11]

Yesterday, the European Union and India held their 13th Summit on 30 March in Brussels, and took steps to deepen their political and economic cooperation. International security, migration, trade and sustainable development were top of the agenda. President Juncker, President Tusk, and Mr Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, participated. High Representative / Vice-President Mogherini, and the Minister of Commerce and Industry of India, Ms Nirmala Sitharaman, also attended. The EU and India have agreed a Joint Summit Statement in which the leaders strongly condemned the terrorist attacks in Brussels on 22 March 2016 as an unacceptable affront to our open democratic societies and extended their deepest condolences to the families and friends of the victims. The EU and India will remain united and firm in the fight against hatred, violent extremism and terrorism. The leaders reconfirmed their commitment to give new momentum to the bilateral relationship endorsing the EU-India Agenda for Action 2020 as a common roadmap to jointly guide and strengthen the India-EU Strategic Partnership over the next five years.  It encompasses a wide range of areas for cooperation such as foreign and security policy, trade and investment, economy, global issues as well as people to people contacts. The Summit also launched two initiativeson climate change and sustainable development,: a new Water Partnership that promotes technological and scientific progress in water management, and a Clean Energy and Climate Partnership for renewable sources of energy. A press release is available here.