Canada and India have agreed to work in direction of a complete commerce deal, reviving efforts that first started 15 years in the past.
Readouts from each Prime Minister Mark Carney and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s workplaces say the pair agreed to start negotiations on an “formidable” complete financial partnership settlement (CEPA).
Modi additionally invited Carney to go to India, which the Prime Minister’s Workplace stated he has accepted for early 2026.
“The flexibility to have simpler commerce with them to scale that commerce with them can be significantly helped by that (an settlement),” Carney instructed reporters earlier Sunday on the G20 summit.
In response to the readout, the commerce settlement can be aimed toward doubling bilateral commerce to $70 billion by 2030.
Carney’s workplace acknowledged that the CEPA would come with items, companies, funding, agriculture and agri-food, digital commerce, labour mobility, and sustainable developments.
The 2 international locations first began talks in 2010, however ultimately downgraded these efforts to a deal that may solely contact particular industries up till fall 2023.
Commerce talks between India and Canada had been suspended in late 2023 after the Ottawa went public with allegations from the RCMP that the Indian authorities was behind the assassination of Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh activist, close to Vancouver in June 2023.
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Earlier this month, International Information additionally confirmed that conversations intercepted by Canada and the UK implicate high-level Indian officers in Nijjar’s assassination.
India was additionally certainly one of 4 international locations named by the top of Canada’s intelligence service, Dan Rogers, as he catalogued the espionage and transnational repression efforts by Canada’s adversaries.
When requested by reporters on Sunday in regards to the menace that is still from India, Carney stated he was conscious of the “menace panorama.”
“With respect to any types of overseas interference, we have now to stay vigilant — we’re vigilant,” he stated.
However the prime minister added he sees India as a dependable buying and selling companion.
“Canada has fairly an precise robust business relationship with India. We’re one of many largest, for instance, overseas buyers in India,” he stated.
“What we’re trying to do is to place that on a sound footing by means of a possible commerce settlement between the 2 international locations, which give protections to our companies, protections to Indian companies, (a) clear algorithm, dispute mechanisms and others and construct on these alternatives.”
The feedback are the alternative of what Carney stated in regards to the U.S. throughout the federal election marketing campaign in March that the U.S. is not a “dependable” buying and selling companion.
Whereas Canada and India plan to work in direction of the commerce deal, the 2 international locations alongside Australia introduced a trilateral expertise and innovation partnership throughout the G20 as effectively. That partnership is aimed toward strengthening cooperation on important minerals, clear vitality and synthetic intelligence (AI).
Modi’s workplace stated in its readout each international locations reaffirmed their civil nuclear cooperation and ongoing discussions on growing collaboration, akin to by means of long-term uranium provide agreements.
Carney’s workplace pledged to extend diplomatic staffing ranges to strengthen “people-to-people linkages.”
The PMO additionally added that the 2 leaders agreed on common reciprocal high-level visits, together with by ministers and members of the enterprise neighborhood.
—with recordsdata from International Information’ David Akin, Stewart Bell, Jeff Semple and Saba Aziz, and The Canadian Press
© 2025 International Information, a division of Corus Leisure Inc.
