Pak Sahafat – British Prime Minister Rishi Sonak, in a phone call with his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi on Thursday, called for speeding up the trade talks between the two countries, which were stalled due to New Delhi’s displeasure with the London government for not condemning the separatist group “Khalistan”.
According to Pak Sahafat News Agency, according to the British Prime Minister’s Office’s account of the content of this phone call, the two sides, while reviewing the “close friendship between the two countries, agreed that great progress has been made in advancing the development roadmap of British-Indian relations.”
Referring to the trade negotiations between the two countries, Sunak and Modi emphasized the importance of what the British side called “the huge opportunities that reaching a free trade agreement can provide for Indian and British companies and consumers”.
Accordingly, both sides agreed to activate their teams to speed up the resolution of the remaining issues and ensure a progressive agreement that will flourish the economies of the two countries.
This is while British news sources announced the suspension of trade talks between the UK and India a while ago. The Times newspaper quoted a senior official of the British government and wrote that the Indian government has made the continuation of the talks conditional on London’s public condemnation of the Khalstan group.
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It is said that supporters of this separatist group attacked the Indian High Commission building in London last month and injured two of its security guards in addition to minor damage to the windows of the building. The British government has condemned this attack, but according to the Times, the Indian government wants to publicly condemn this group.
An unnamed British government source said in an interview with The Times: India has said it doesn’t want to talk about trade because it thinks we don’t take the attack on the Indian High Commission and the Sikh separatist movement seriously.
In a phone call with his Indian counterpart, the British Prime Minister condemned the “unacceptable violence against the Indian High Commission building in London and stressed that Extremism has no place in Britain. He also informed the Indian side about the measures taken to ensure the safety of the employees of the Indian High Commission.
Earlier, British Foreign Minister James Cleverly called the behavior of the Khalstan group unacceptable and said that the country’s police are investigating the issue. But the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of India was not convinced by the position of the British side and wanted a public condemnation of this separatist group.
Trade talks between London and New Delhi have stalled as Britain tries to develop its trade relations with countries around the world in the post-Brexit era. India is considered one of the biggest business targets of the UK and according to statistics; the volume of trade between the two countries is estimated at 35 billion dollars a year.